UEFA Champions League · League Stage - 1

Real Madrid–Marseille

2–1

HT 1–1

Kick-off: Tuesday, 16 September 2025 at 19:00
Status: Match Finished
Venue: Estadio Santiago Bernabéu, Madrid

What the model said, and what happened

Prediction correct

This verdict goes into the public record unchanged; we do not filter out the ones we get wrong. The model's track record

Goals and red cards

22'MarseilleT. Weah (assist: M. Greenwood)
29'Real MadridKylian Mbappé (penalty)
72'Real MadridD. Carvajal · red card
81'Real MadridKylian Mbappé (penalty)

Match statistics

Match statistics
Real Madrid		Marseille
28	Shots	15
15	Shots on target	5
20	Shots inside the box	10
4	Goalkeeper saves	13
9	Corners	4
1	Offsides	3
43%	Possession	57%
402	Passes	524
344	Accurate passes

What we expected, and what happened

Expected goals before kick-off: Real Madrid 2.20 · Marseille 1.28. On the pitch: 2-1.
Shots Real Madrid 28 · Marseille 15; on target 15 and 5.
Marseille kept the ball more (57%).

Referee

I. Peljto→

3.87

yellows per match

0.19

reds per match

matches of data

Model prediction

Why this prediction?

The model puts the most likely outcome at 58.6%: “Real Madrid to win”. Second comes “Marseille to win” at 21.8%.
Behind that distribution are the expected goals: 2.20 for Real Madrid, 1.28 for Marseille.
The highest double chance value is 80.4% (12 — any result other than a draw).
These values were computed from 2,209 past matches.

This is a prediction, not a guarantee; a probability is not a certainty.

These sentences are built by a fixed template; every number in them comes straight from the model's computation, none invented while the text was written.

Real Madrid to win58.6%

Draw19.6%

Marseille to win21.8%

When the model has said 55–60% in the past, 1,158 of 1,982 predictions were correct (58.4%). Accuracy record →

9	Fouls	14

3	Yellow cards	2

1	Red cards	0

What these probabilities rest on

Expected goals comes out of a team's attack weighed against its opponent's defence. A strong attack is damped when it meets a strong defence — which is why comparing the ratings on their own is misleading.

How many goals Real Madrid score2.20

Attack: Real Madrid score 55% more than the league's average team — one of the sharpest attacks in the league.

Opponent's defence: Marseille's defence is close to the league average (0.87×), so it doesn't move the expectation much.

Result: These two effects give an expectation of 2.20 goals (including home advantage).

How many goals Marseille score1.28

Attack: Marseille score above the league average (29% more).

Opponent's defence: Real Madrid concede 15% fewer than the league average, which pulls the expectation down.

Result: These two effects give an expectation of 1.28 goals (including the away penalty).

Most likely scorelines

2–19.5%1–18.4%2–07.5%

A single scoreline is always less likely than an outcome: “home win” is the sum of 1-0, 2-0, 2-1 and dozens more. So the most likely single score can be a draw while the most likely outcome is a home win; the two do not contradict each other.

Week 1 of the season. This prediction was computed from previous seasons. Summer transfers, budget changes and squad rebuilds aren't in the ratings yet — the model can only see that a team has been rebuilt once new results come in.

We measured this and we're not hiding it: in the opening week of past seasons the model came in 3.3 points below the accuracy it claimed (n=220) — for the rest of the season it beats its own claim. The tendency points this way, though it is not proof on its own: in the opening week it slightly over-calls home wins (said 42.7%, got 39.5%) and slightly under-calls draws (said 26.1%, got 28.2%).

This sample is small and not statistically established, which is why we do not correct the model for it. The correction we tried (pulling probabilities toward the league average) didn't win on holdout, so it wasn't added. Read opening-week predictions with a little more caution.