Figures updated from issue 017 - August 1993
Move over Manchester United, your time is past...
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SOPHIST's CHOICEThe law of probability and why Barrow can
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So you might think our chances of promotion this year are pretty slim, eh? Well, think again, for one of the best known of the laws of statistics, the law of probability, dictates that Barrow can look forward to a period of unprecedented success and prosperity for at least the next fourteen years. How? Let me explain. It's all to do with something as simple as the throw of a dice (erm, that's 'die'. There's only one. Die is singular, dice plural. Pedantic Ed.). On any throw the chances of a number coming up are one in six. So if you threw one die six times you'd expect that each face would come up once apiece. However, it's very unlikely to happen quite that way. I tried it and got three two's, a one, a three and a five. But if I were to throw the same die six thousand times, the chances are that the discrepancy would even out and that each face would fall up about a thousand times. And so it is with football. As the record stands at present Barrow have lost 316 more games than they have won in all games in all leagues since 1922 (see [1] below). Now isn't that enough time for probability to come into effect and even things up a bit, just like it would with the die? We reckon it is and that's why our fortunes are about to change very soon. Thus with probability on our side, how long would it take to achieve a record of .501 (slightly better than even)? Well, the team would have to win 317 games more than it lost and based on our best season of recent years - the NPL Championship of 1984 [2] - then it would have to play 512 games before that happened [3]. Obviously with a sustained record like that we would win every league we entered in that period. Assuming that each league had 42 teams then at the start of the 2011-12 season, our all time record would be as in [4] below and we would have taken all the honours shown in the table titled 'Barrow AFC: Projected Honours 1999-2012'. And after just eight games of the season, we would finally reach the total of having won one more match than we had lost (see [5] and [6] below) with an end of season record as outlined in [7]. Far fetched? Not at all. Look at the consistency Liverpool achieved over a twenty year period up until the early nineties. Well, the boys in red and the rest of the football world can look out. Now it's our turn! |
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P |
W |
D |
L |
F |
A |
% |
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1. |
Barrow AFC all time league record 1922-2000 |
3114 |
1051 |
697 |
1366 |
4174 |
5084 |
.449 |
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2. |
NPL Championship 1984 record |
42 |
29 |
10 |
3 |
92 |
38 |
.810 |
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3. |
Games to play to achieve record of .501 |
512 |
353 |
122 |
37 |
1122 |
464 |
.809 |
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4. |
All time record at start of 2012-13 season |
3618 |
1398 |
817 |
1403 |
5278 |
5540 |
.499 |
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5. |
Games to play in 2012-13 season to achieve .501 |
8 |
6 |
2 |
0 |
18 |
8 |
.875 |
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6. |
Games played when .501 record achieved |
3626 |
1404 |
819 |
1403 |
5296 |
5548 |
.501 |
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7. |
All time record at end of 2012-13 season |
3660 |
1427 |
827 |
1406 |
5370 |
5578 |
.503 |
Barrow AFC: Projected Honours 2000-12
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2000-01 • |
Champions - UniBond League Premier Division |
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