AI match prediction: Buddy

Same match, same rules

Buddy predicts exactly the same matches as users, under the same lock time and the same scoring rules. It also appears in the leaderboard as a row, under the same ranking rules — "I beat it" means nothing if the rival you are chasing is not in the table. Its row is marked "AI", so your own rank is read against a table that includes it.

How it works

For each side, Buddy derives an attack and a defence coefficient from matches played in the same competition over the last two years, multiplies those by the competition's scoring level to get an expected-goals figure for each team, and reads every scoreline's probability off a Poisson grid. The scoreline it predicts is not the grid's single most likely cell but the one that maximises expected points under the scoring rule — which is why draws come up rarely, and that's by design, not a mistake.

A live record, not a claim

The box below is Buddy's current record — the periods it did well in and the ones it didn't are both shown as they are. No period is hidden or highlighted over another.

Overall record

This record spans more than one model version.

Predictions

521

Points

1151

Per match

2.21

Result accuracy

53%

Exact score

10%

155 of these predictions were made in competitions with little history — Buddy leaned on a hand-written prior.

Buddy's record by competition

Competition	Predictions	Result accuracy	Exact score	Per match
UEFA Nations League	104	50%	9%	2.11
🌍International Friendly	69 †	41%	6%	1.57
La Liga	49 †	53%	14%	2.41
Turkish Süper Lig	47 †	51%	9%	2.02
UEFA Champions League	45 †	69%	7%	2.56
Serie A	41 †	56%	15%	2.56
Premier League	40 †	40%	5%	1.55
Bundesliga	36 †	50%	11%	2.17
Ligue 1	36 †	75%	22%	3.56
UEFA Europa League	36 †	47%	8%	1.94
UEFA Conference League	18 †	67%	17%	2.94

† Some predictions in this competition leaned on a hand-written prior because the history was thin.

Frequently asked questions

How does Buddy produce a prediction?

Buddy uses a statistical model that calculates home win, draw and away win probabilities from historical match data, then produces a scoreline prediction from those probabilities using a Poisson distribution.

Does Buddy compete with users on the leaderboard?

Yes. Buddy appears in the leaderboard as a row labelled "AI", under the same ranking rules as everyone else, so your rank is read against a table that includes it.

Does Buddy predict every competition equally well?

Same model, but each competition with its own history. We hold years of Süper Lig matches; the European sample is far smaller, and the backtest measures those slices separately. That is why the record is given competition by competition — a single average would hide it.

How is Buddy's record verified?

Buddy's score is calculated under exactly the same rules and the same data as users' scores, and updates on the leaderboard page for anyone to see.

What are Buddy's backtest results?

The latest measurement is dated 2026-09-08, over 3,962 matches across 15 leagues: result accuracy 50.7% (the actual home-win rate in the data is 44.1%), exact-score accuracy 9.5%, average points per match 2.12. The Süper Lig slice was measured separately: result accuracy 50.0%, points per match 2.13. The low draw-prediction rate (1.5%) is not a bug — it's a consequence of the scoring rule, since a draw never earns the goal-difference bonus and so rarely maximises expected points.