In a season of upsets, form
reversals and some old heavyweights leaving it late to make their run at this
year’s AFL premiership, it’s nice to be able to call on a mathematician to tell us
who’s most likely to be in the final eight after round 22.

Each year Footystats – the leading
AFL statistical website – relies on Martin Windsor-Black to break out his slide
rule and you will be comforted to know that
based on the 2,361,183,241,434,822,606,848 possibilities before round 14,
Windsor-Black has produced a “most likely” outcome for each club up to the end
of the regular season.

According to Footystats editor
Kevin Taylor, his colleague “made certain assumptions favouring the home state
advantage and home teams, and the relative positions on the ladder.” But as last Friday night’s
Collingwood win over Port Adelaide shows, the form book is best left
to sucker punters and mathematicians. You can check out how your own team
is considered “most likely” to fare for the rest of the season here.

Windsor-Black “figures” West Coast
will finish on top and Carlton the bottom.
I doubt you need a slide rule to work that out!