Heterogeneous ensembles of classifiers in predicting Bundesliga football results

Abstract Predicting sports results is a well-known problem, and it applies to the more predictable individual sports as well as to the less predictable team sports – e.g., football. In the vast amount of information and parameters that are associated with team sports, there are few solutions related to the comprehensive approach of knowledge discovery in databases (KDD). In this paper, we propose a new approach to the whole process of discovering knowledge from data to predict the result of Bundesliga football matches. The main goal of the paper is to improve the prediction of football match results using heterogeneous ensembles of classifiers. To achieve the goal, it is necessary to prepare a training set and to develop a learning model – in this case, we analyze whether the use of limited information allows for the correct prediction of the results of football matches. The use of the developed model based on heterogeneous ensembles in the prediction of Bundesliga match results allows for improved prediction compared to classical ensembles models and single classifiers. Additionally, the possibilities arising from the use of heterogeneous ensembles of classifiers allow to distinguish some of the analyzed cases. The proposed approach was tested on real-world data, the results of Bundesliga football matches analyzed from the 2010/2011 season to the 2019/2020 season. Experiments were performed on methods selected based on an in-depth literature review. Conducted experiments, supported by the proper statistical analysis, confirm the usefulness of the proposed approach in predicting Bundesliga football results.