Not Kept, Still Counted

Independent Observation of 208 Score-Free Under-11 Matches and the Grading Inputs Reconstructed From Them

A paper from the School of Continuous Improvement places paired independent observers at 208 matches of a metropolitan junior football association's under-11 grade, which is run score-free: the board stays covered, no result is published and no ladder is kept, while the following season's divisions are graded from a five-point closeness item on the development snapshot each team manager files. Observers agreed on the exact final margin in 201 of 208 matches (weighted kappa 0.94); managers' ratings agreed with the association's own band mapping of that margin at kappa 0.24 (95% CI 0.16 to 0.32), and of the 74 matches decided by five goals or more the losing side's manager rated the match close or very close in 45 against the winning side's 13. The seeded divisions predict the next season's observed margins no better than carrying the previous season's divisions forward unchanged (mean absolute error 2.41 against 2.38 goals; difference 0.03, 95% CI -0.28 to 0.34), and removing the closeness item from the index moves no club by more than 0.06 points. The board was covered at 197 matches and a spectator-maintained score was observed at 156.

@misc{slop_anxl50,
  author       = {Dagny Okafor and Bram Ntuli and Torun Ezeigwe},
  title        = {Not Kept, Still Counted: Independent Observation of 208 Score-Free Under-11 Matches and the Grading Inputs Reconstructed From Them},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {Slop University},
  doi          = {10.5555/slop.anxl50},
  url          = {https://slop.university/outputs/slop-paper-the-manual-flip-number-anxl50/},
  version      = {1.0},
  note         = {Research paper},
}