Graphic: and the winner is

I am going to let you make your own mind up. I don't want you thinking I am going to do this all the time. But just this once, I don't see as it can cause any harm. The real reason I am doing this is that I can't make up my mind, so you have to.

It's Chelsea's “Big Phil” Scolari who is the cause of the problem. (Actually he isn't that big. He is just under 6ft. A data-driven column such as the Fink Tank can't go calling him “Big Phil” with stats like that. And he isn't small enough to justify the use of “Big” as some sort of joke. Our computer modelling might permit “Quite Big” Phil.)

The thing is that it is hard to say whether Chelsea did the right thing getting rid of “Quite Big” Phil. So I thought I would lay out the data that Dr Henry Stott, Dr Ian Graham and Dr Mark Latham have gathered and allow you to make of it what you will.

Chelsea say that they have sacked the manager because they want to stay competitive in the trophies that they are still contesting. If that is their aim, they are too late. Their chance of winning the league is only 2 per cent. They did not start as favourites, but they did stand a real (30 per cent) chance.

They also went through a period when they became favourites. Now, however, it is close to being over. (Only close to over because Manchester United did once fall to a 4 per cent chance before being champions.) On the other hand, if Chelsea's concern was to avoid dropping out of the Champions League places, they should not have worried. On the day the season started they had a 95 per cent chance of qualifying for next season's Champions League. This has now fallen. To 94 per cent.

Chelsea are 5.3 points below the level we expected them to reach. This can be divided into two parts. Against the lower teams they have actually done slightly better than expected, but against the “big four” their performance has been disastrously worse. We expected them to gain 7.9 points and they have actually gained only one. If your view is that the manager's job is to help in the crunch games, because the rest look after themselves, then clearly “Quite Big” Phil failed.

You may take the alternative view that luck and money settle most things and that managers are beside the point. Well, it is certainly the case that Scolari saw Chelsea's attack improve and their defence get worse, leaving them pretty much as they were at the beginning of the season and pretty much as good as United (it may not look like that to watch, but that is what the data says).

Their poor performance might then be luck. There is a 20 per cent chance that Chelsea would do as badly as they have without the team having changed in terms of class. Set against this, Scolari did very well in his opening games and then pretty poorly in the next tranche. This is a classic pattern for managers riding their luck before being shown up.

Was “Quite Big” Phil let down by his players? Whatever the reason, the answer is yes. Most have done worse this season, according to our player level computer model. The exceptions are Nicolas Anelka and John Obi Mikel and (slightly) Ricardo Carvalho. Should “Quite Big” Phil have stayed, or gone? Your shout.