Champions League Win Rate Analysis

This project analyzes Champions League team statistics to identify which metrics (other than goals/assists) most strongly correlate with winning. Data is collected from FBref using custom Python web scraping utilities.

---

Requirements & Setup

Prerequisites

• Python 3.8+
• pip

Install dependencies

pip install requests pandas beautifulsoup4

(optional but recommended: use a virtual environment)

Project Files

• Webscraping.py → contains scraping functions (linkloader, write_to_csv_from_file)
• analysis.py (or similar) → contains win_rate_analysis_tournament()
• output/ → directory where generated CSVs will be saved

---

Workflow

1. Load Links Use the linkloader() function in Webscraping.py with a Champions League stats page URL (example: 2018–19 season).

   from Webscraping import linkloader
   linkloader("https://fbref.com/en/comps/8/2018-2019/2018-2019-Champions-League-Stats")

   This generates a CSV file containing all match links (used to avoid rate-limit errors).

2. Generate Match Data CSVs Run:

   from Webscraping import write_to_csv_from_file
   write_to_csv_from_file("2018-2019 Champions League.csv")

   This will create 3 CSV files (QF, SF, Ro16) with team stats for every game from the Round of 16 to the Semifinals (52 games).

3. Analyze Win Rates Use the generated files with win_rate_analysis_tournament():

   from analysis import win_rate_analysis_tournament
   win_rate_analysis_tournament("QF_file.csv", "SF_file.csv", "Ro16_file.csv")

   This computes how often a team leading in various stats (e.g., shots, xG, passes) won or drew their matches.

---

Example Results (2018–19 Edition)

• Leading in PK Converted → won/drew 71.15% of matches
• Leading in Shots on Target → 65.38%
• Leading in Red Cards (fewer) → 69.23%
• Leading in GCA (Goal-Creating Actions) → 73.07%
• Leading in npXG → 63.46%
• Leading in Tackles → 50.0%
• Leading in Blocked Shots → 44.23%

(Full breakdown in output logs.)

---

Other Seasons

Repeat the same steps with any Champions League stats page in this format:

• 2020–21 Champions League
• 2019–20 Champions League
• 2018–19 Champions League

Works with any main Champions League stats page on FBref.

---

Summary

• Scrapes match-level team stats (Round of 16 to Semifinals).
• Avoids rate-limit errors by staging link collection.
• Outputs CSVs + win-rate analysis for multiple stats.
• Reusable across seasons.