Dennis Thomas

Team performance: the case of English Premiership football

Sporting production function studies have been almost entirely US based concentrating largely, although not exclusively, on baseball. Mainly due to a dearth of match play statistics, there have been few studies of other sports, with that of association football being a significant omission given the sports international appeal and global coverage. This study attempts to redress the balance by utilizing a new data source, containing information on a range of specific play variables, to estimate a production function for English Premiership football. Our results emphasize the key attacking and defensive skills, and provide support for the notion that teams may intentionally employ dubious or illegal tactics to succeed. The inclusion of team effects provides evidence consistent with the view of the emergence of an elite group of clubs dominating the league. Copyright

Home field effect and team performance: Evidence from English Premiership football

This article discusses the home-field effect in professional team sports and provides further evidence of home advantage in association football as played in the English Premier League. Utilizing play data it employs match-based production function to investigate the home-field effect on within-match performance by home and away teams.

Voluntary corporate governance disclosures by post-Apartheid South African corporations

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate as to whether post-Apartheid South African (SA) listed corporations voluntarily comply with and disclose recommended good corporate governance (CG) practices and, if so, the major factors that influence such voluntary CG disclosure behaviour. Design/methodology/approach - The paper constructs a broad voluntary CG disclosure index containing 50 CG provisions from the 2002 King Report using a sample of 169 SA listed corporations from 2002 to 2006. The authors also conduct regression analysis to identify the main drivers of voluntary CG disclosure. Findings - The results suggest that while compliance with, and disclosure of, good CG practices varies substantially among the sampled companies, CG standards have generally improved over the five-year period examined. The authors also find that block ownership is negatively associated with voluntary CG disclosure, while board size, audit firm size, cross-listing, the presence of a CG committee, government ownership and institutional ownership are positively related to voluntary CG disclosure. Practical implications - These findings have important implications for policy-makers and regulators. Evidence of improving CG standards implies that efforts by various stakeholders at improving CG standards in SA companies have had some positive impact on CG practices of SA firms. However, the substantial variation in the levels of compliance implies that enforcement may need to be strengthened further. Originality/value - There is a dearth of evidence on the level of compliance with the King Report. This study fills this gap by providing evidence for the first time on the level of compliance achieved, as well as contributing generally to the literature on compliance with codes of good governance and voluntary disclosure.

Production and Efficiency in Association Football

Despite their proliferation, sporting production function studies remain almost entirely U.S.-based, concentrating largely (although not exclusively) on baseball. Mainly due to a dearth of match-play statistics, there have been few studies of other, more interactive sports. This study attempts to partly fill the gap by using a new data source containing information on specific match-play variables to estimate a season-based production function for English Premiership association football teams. On the basis of computed residuals, the authors also identify those teams shown to be relatively efficient and inefficient in various aspects of match plays.

Entrepreneurship and rural economic development: a scenario analysis approach

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to advocate the use of scenario analysis to develop foresight for the improvement of policies supporting rural entrepreneurship and illustrate the approach with an application in Mid Wales.Design/methodology/approach – A general overview of the economic problems of rural areas and their manifestation in the case study of Mid Wales is followed by an outline of the origins and approach of scenario analysis. Application of the technique involved a group of policy makers and entrepreneurs undertaking a structured programme of scenario development. The resulting scenarios, their usefulness for enterprise support, and wider implications are summarised.Findings – The scenario analysis exercise enabled key stakeholders to confront and deal with considerable uncertainties by developing a shared understanding of the barriers to small firm growth and rural economic regeneration.Research limitations/implications – A major conclusion is that effective approaches for support of ru...

Bargaining in the transfer market: theory and evidence

This paper examines the transfer market for association football players as operated in the English Football League using transfer data for the 1990–91 season. After describing the purposes and procedures involved in the transfer system together with the motives of the participants, we apply two-person bargaining theory to analyse the determination of transfer fees. The data and estimation procedures are explained and the results reported and interpreted. Our analysis suggests that the Nash bargaining theory captures the salient features of the bargaining process in the footballers transfer market.

An investigation of home advantage and other factors affecting outcomes in English one-day cricket matches

We examined the factors affecting the outcome of cricket matches played in the English one-day county cricket league. In particular, we focused on the home-field effect and the importance of winning the pre-match toss of a coin to determine a teams strategic decision to bat first or second. A home-field effect appeared to be confirmed in that home teams won 57% of all matches with a win/loss result. A logistical regression model was used, with the outcome variable defined in terms of a home team win/loss. We found that while winning the toss is an important aspect of a one-day cricket match, other factors tend to dominate in determining the result, especially team quality and match importance for the home and away teams in the overall league context. Our results also indicate, not surprisingly given the nature of cricket attendance and spectating, that the crowd effect is largely insignificant. The results of our study do not support any rule changes requiring the abandonment of the coin toss to determine batting order.

The preservation of indigenous accounting systems in a subaltern community

Purpose - The paper aims to examine how indigenous accounting practices are mobilised in the daily life of a subaltern community, and how and why the members of that community have managed to preserve such practices over time despite external pressures for change. Design/methodology/approach - An ethno-methodological field study is employed to produce a text that informs readers about the ways in which people engage in social accounting practices. It uses the concepts of structuration theory to understand how indigenous accounting systems are shaped by the interplay between the actions of agents and social structures. Findings - The case study suggests that it is the strongly prevailing patronage based political system, as mobilised into the subaltern social structure, which makes individuals unable to change and exercise their agencies, and tends to “preserve” and “sustain” indigenous accounting systems. Social accounting is seen as the common language of the inhabitants in their everyday life, as sanctioned by the unique form of autonomy-dependency relationship shaped by patronage politics. Research limitations/implications - The findings imply that any form of rational transformations in indigenous accounting systems in local subaltern communities requires a phenomenological analysis of any prevailing and dominant patronage political systems. Originality/value - This is the first empirical study that focuses on how and why local subaltern communities preserve their indigenous accounting practices over time. This contrasts with previous work that has focused on the presence or absence of accounting beyond work organisations.

MAINTAINING MARKET POSITION: TEAM PERFORMANCE, REVENUE AND WAGE EXPENDITURE IN THE ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE

This paper investigates the relationship between playing success and commercial success in team sports. Utilizing a data set relating to the English Premier League that combines both financial measures and indicators of playing skills and performances, our empirical analysis is based on three behavioural equations. Our analysis indicates that on‐field success can be directly related to players’ skills and abilities and that revenue is positively related to on‐field success. Wage expenditure is also shown to systematically reflect player skills and performances. One interpretation of this evidence is that investment in players’ skills and ability buys on‐field success, with richer teams becoming ever richer and able to maintain or even build upon success by spending more on players than less successful clubs. To the extent that richer clubs are successful in their objective there is a causal link between revenue earned and competitive imbalance via investments in players. The implications of this tendency within a league are discussed in our conclusion, which also considers the potentially wider implications of our study as they relate to the evolution of firm size and issues of market share.

Attendance demand and core support: evidence from limited-overs cricket

In this paper we construct and estimate a model for match attendances in English one-day, limited-overs league cricket. Our dataset separates ‘pay at gate’ spectators from club members, enabling us to distinguish between the attendance decisions of casual spectators and those of the, potentially, more committed ‘core’ supporters. In addition to providing a more direct analysis of the relatively underdeveloped issue of ‘core support’, we also investigate variability within the core. Apart from providing further evidence regarding demand determination in professional team sports we consider some specific policy implications particular to the ‘peculiar’ sport of cricket.