ANALYSE THIS: Australia overtakes Great Britain in Virtual Medal Table

GENERAL – Australia has moved into fourth position in the Infostrada Sports’ Virtual Medal Table (VMT) after the inclusion of athletics and swimming personal bests since May 2015 took projected golds away from Germany and Great Britain and added four medals to Australia’s forecast total.

ANALYSE THIS: USA, Germany, Japan & Canada expected in last four

FOOTBALL – The FIFA World rankings for women’s football have provided a good basis for our forecast so far with seven of our eight favourites in the second round progressing through to the quarter-finals. In addition, our pre-tournament forecast correctly predicted six of the eight quarter-finalists, and two of the exact match-ups (France v Germany and England v Canada) in this round. Our updated forecast for the quarter-final matches expects the United States to play Germany and Japan to play Canada in the last four. These exact semi-final pairings were also predicted in our pre-tournament forecast.

ANALYSE THIS: Tough opposition reduces Germany’s title chances

FOOTBALL – Germany are no longer the favourites to lift the FIFA Women’s World Cup. Their chance has decreased to around 20% due to their tough route to the semifinals, where they will probably meet new favourites United States who have a 28% chance of claiming the title.

ANALYSE THIS: Germany slight favourites at FIFA Women’s World Cup

FOOTBALL – Germany are the favourites for the FIFA Women’s World Cup, but only just, according to a new analysis from Infostrada Sports. The United States are second favourites and there is nearly 50% chance of the winners being one or the other of these two teams. They are, however, most likely to meet each other at the semi-final stage of the competition.

REVIEW: Messi & Ronaldo and the German connection

FOOTBALL – Lionel Messi scored twice for Barcelona in their 3-0 win against Bayern Munchen to reach a total of 14 CL goals against German teams, equal as many as Cristiano Ronaldo. Check out more below.

INFOGRAPHIC: Poland eyeing first win over Germany

FOOTBALL – Poland will be chasing their first ever win against neighbours Germany as the teams go head-to-head in Group D of the 2016 European Championship qualification. Click on the picture to see the infographic in full size.

FIVE FAST FACTS: Poland – Germany Euro 2016 Qualifier

FOOTBALL – The following is a preview for this Saturday’s Euro 2016 Qualifying match between Poland and Germany.

ANALYSE THIS: More Swedes than English in Champions League

FOOTBALL – Players from 64 different countries played in this week’s Champions League with their time on the pitch ranging from 4019 minutes by the 55 Brazilians appearing for 20 different clubs in the competition to a five minute appearance for Ludogorets by Tunisian Hamza Younes. England has the maximum number of clubs in the competition but English players were only 11^th in terms of playing time, lagging behind smaller nations such as Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden.

ANALYSE THIS: Germany lose number one spot, Dutch in freefall

FOOTBALL – Now that the dust has settled on the week’s international matches in Europe, a glance at the Infostrada Sports’ National Team Ranking reveals a few major changes since the World Cup  including Germany’s loss of the top spot to Argentina after losing at home to their World Cup final opponents and the Dutch national team dropping from third to ninth after two defeats. There is now just one European team, Germany, in the top five as Spain have dropped a place.

ANALYSE THIS: Overwhelming favourites in Groups A to D

FOOTBALL: Euro 2016 qualification begins this weekend and two of the top seeded teams in the draw, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Italy, are not the favourites to win their groups according to the Infostrada Sports’ National Team Ranking. Six of the nine groups have an overwhelming favourite to be group winner and only one of the groups looks truly competitive at this stage. We begin our assessment of the groups by looking at A to D.