ESPN gives USA 56% chance of advancing

[from our friends at Project-2010.net]

Nate Silver (of fivethirtyeight.com and baseball statistics fame) has just written an article for espn.com in which he crunches the numbers for World Cup Group C, and gives the USA a 56% chance of advancing (with a 22% chance of winning the group). We don't really know exactly what numbers he's crunching (other than the "Soccer Power Index" (which, by the way, have England at #3 in the world...a little optimistic, methinks), but it makes for an interesting read.