By John Considine

A reference to a 2008 paper by myself and three colleagues will pop up regularly in the popular media.  Two weeks ago it surfaced again.  This time it featured in the Sunday Times.  The piece was written by Colin Coyle (here).  The 2008 paper examined the distribution of National Lottery funded sports capital grant allocations.  There are a fair few previous posts on this issue.  The image to the right is of the original article.

Colin Coyle's piece in the Sunday Times explained how there is going to be a public consultation on the allocation of National Lottery funds in Ireland.  A recent paper in Public Choice examined the situation in Israel.  The title of the paper by Momi Dahan and Itamar Yakir captures much of the content - "Revealed political favoritism: evidence from the allocation of state lottery grants in Israel".  The paper examines a shift from a discretionary allocation system to a more rule-based allocation system.  The authors found that favouritism towards the Jewish municipalities decreased with the move to the rules-based system.  With a bit of luck, the folks heading up the public consultation (Indecon) will read Dahan and Yakir paper. 

It would be a mistake to presume that any rule will solve all the problems.  It will depend on the quality of the rule.  Six years ago, Justin Doran and myself examined the problems with an informal rule (here, also published in Public Choice).  Dahan and Yakir's paper gives a more promising message.

By Robbie Butler

In many ways it is very surprising that Liverpool's legendary German manager Jurgen Klopp is now the longest serving manager currently at a club in the English Premier League (EPL). Having been appointed in October 2015, the German is now almost 2,400 days into the job at Anfield. It does not seem that long ago that he was appointed, and to now be the longest serving manager demonstrates just how precarious a job football management has become.

Nearly six years ago I wrote this piece here. It explores the job of management in the EPL and how the number of days managers now get in the job is trending downwards. I suspect this has continued in the years 2017-2022. At no other point in the history of the EPL has the longest serving manager, being in the job just six year. 

If Klopp were to leave today, the mantle would pass to Pep Guardiola, appointed as recently as 2016. Next on the list, when one considers manager who have just served their clubs in the EPL, is Ralph Hasenhüttl who was appointed in December 2018. He will start his 5th season with Southampton in August. It is testament to the man and the club that he has continued in place as long, having suffered two 9-0 loses during his time, one of which came at home to Leicester.  

As time has passed, managers serving into their 5th season like Hasenhüttl, have become rarer and rarer. Klopp, while only in charge 6 and a half years, is starting to assume the qualities of Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger. It would appear surviving that 7 seasons today is not too dissimilar 20 or more during the 1990s and 2000s.  

By David Butler

The race for the top-4 in the Premier League has heated up again given two surprising outcomes in the last round of fixtures – Tottenham’s home loss to Brighton and Arsenal’s win at Chelsea.  This post was motivated by the former fixture.

From watching the match, and reading commentary in newspapers and online, there seemed to be a relative consensus on Tottenham’s poor performance. Adjectives such as lethargic, listless and sluggish were used to describe the home team.

I often wonder whether scheduling factors play a role. Tottenham’s match was the early (12.30) kick-off.  Are players as motivated for the early match?

Maybe one performance stat to consider whether a team is ‘at it’ is pressing. This is the number of times in a match players apply pressure to the opposing player who is receiving, carrying or releasing the ball.
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Below shows Tottenham’s pressing averages over the last three seasons across the schedule. The matches fall into seven relatively natural cohorts (minimum of 20 matches in each one). While we have to keep in mind that the schedule is not random, and this can dictate opponent quality, Spurs tend to press less on average in the earliest kick-offs compared to fixtures later on.  On average, Spurs pressed 142 per match in 12.30 kick-offs, while they clocked up 10-14 more presses in the later evening matches. 

By Robbie Butler

Some time ago now, I wrote this piece about Luton Town and the many relegations and promotions the club had gone through in recent times. At an event online in the US last week, I was reminded about how unusually this is to those in North America. In fact, the open systems that exist in Europe are much more competitive than the US sports model. The European Super League was doomed for many reasons, with one of the main reasons being the removal of the open system.

Luton Town are still on the march. Now in their third season in the second tier of English football, the club currently sit in 4th place. While automatic promotion to the English Premier League is unlikely, there is a strong possibility of the club making the playoffs and gaining promotion through this route.

What a rise this will be. While I am old enough to remember Luton playing in the old top tier in the early 1990s, the club was relegated the season before the Premier League started. They have remained outside the top tier since. However, what is more remarkable, is that they were not in the Football League (top 92 clubs) as recently as May 2014. A journey to the Premier League for the start of the 2022/23 season would be some achievement.

And while Luton rise, spare a thought for Oldham Athletic. The Latics may become the first team to leave the Football League having once played in the Premier League. The club spent two seasons in the newly formed Premier League from 1992 to 1994. They have not returned since. They now sit in the relegation zone of England's 4th tier.

Next month we will know if they will leave the Football League. And should they, those involved should take some comfort from Luton Town. Anything is possible.

By John Considine

Tomorrow's winner of the women's Paris-Roubaix road-cycling race will get €20,000.  That is a staggering increase from the €1,535 that last year's winner took home.  The overall prize money has increased to €50,000 from €7,000 in 2021.  While this remains just over 50% of the prize money for the men's race, the progress in one year is substantial.

Last year's winner will not be at the start line and, therefore, will not be taking home either the larger cheque or another cobble-stone trophy.  In this respect, the women's race is similar to the men's race that takes place on Sunday.  However, there is a vast difference in the history of the events.  The 2021 women's race was the first edition of a race.  The men's race started in 1896.  It is one of what are known as the five monuments.  These are monumental one-day races in many ways.  For example, the winner in each of the five men's races in 2021 took over six hours to complete the race.  One race stretched to 6 hours and over 39 minutes.

The long history of the event allows us to look at the historical outcomes of the race.  One such outcome of interest is the long-run distribution of winners.  Below is the cumulative distribution of winners since 1946 for Paris-Roubaix.  Another monument is included for comparison purposes, i.e. Tour of Flanders.  Both have 76 winners but in the case of Paris-Roubaix it includes two winners after a controversy in 1949 and no winner in 2020 when the race was not run for pandemic related reasons.  Of the 76 winners, Paris-Roubaix has 54 different individuals winning at least one race whereas the Tour of Flanders has 59.

By Robbie Butler

I had the privilege of being part of a very special occasion on Saturday when Rodney Fort – University of Michigan – delivered a retirement lecture on his near 40 year involvement in economics and sports economics. The lecture was part of a series of presentations, organised and hosted by Stefan Szymanski, highlighting Rod’s contributions to the field.

Attendees included Joel Maxcy, Dennis Coates, Steve Ross, Jason Winfree, Victor Matheson, Brad Humphreys, Jane Ruseski, Ryan Pinheiro and Neil Longley. Others joined online including Placido Rodriguez, Roger Noll and Young Hoon Lee. A fitting group to celebrate Rod’s enormous contribution to the field.

And this cannot be understated. The expression “He wrote the textbook” is sometimes used to describe an academic that knows a lot about their field. In Rod’s case this is literally true. He wrote the textbook in sports economics (Paul Downward and Pete Dawson share this honour).

Rod is one of the first – if not the first - sports economists to retire who’s entire career has spanned sports economics. As the field started to emerged rapidly in the early 1970s, academics began to publish in the area. Many of these had long established careers and published in different areas pre- and post-sports their economics papers. Rod’s contributions span the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s and now 2020s. He’s works are part of the formative development of the field.

Three in particular stand out.

Fort, R., & Quirk, J. (1995). Cross-subsidization, incentives, and outcomes in professional team sports leagues in the Journal of Economic Literature is a masterclass. It is cited more than 1,000 times. The other two are his books with Jim Quirk – Pay Dirt (1992) and Hardball (1999). In many respects, both were ahead of their time.  Combined, the two are cited more than 1,000 times.

As Rod finished his lecture on Saturday he confirmed that he would continue researching in the field. This is the beauty of academia and I was delighted to here him say it. Rod has been a pleasure to collaborate with in recent years and has been very supportive of our work in Cork and the many contributions on this blog. His visited to us in 2017 is fondly recalled by many here.

I wish Rod the very best in the next stage of his career and look forward to seeing his next wave of research in the years ahead. Well done Rod!

By John Considine

Over the last couple of months there has been a number of media stories about the problems of sourcing ash for hurley-making.  Recent concerns come on top of the longer term problem of ash-dieback disease.  At the end of March, Canning Hurleys issued a statement saying that they were about to cease trading.  This prompted one elected representative to put down a parliamentary question on the issue (see below).

The Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture answered.  She took the opportunity to explain the support provided by her department and she drew attention to the ash die-back disease.  She claimed that during the last decade over 80% of the planks for making-hurleys were imported.  She listed a number of countries from where the ash was imported.  It included the Ukraine.  The Minister said "A number of hurley-makers import ash planks from Ukraine and this supply is disrupted due to the Russian invasion".

I decided to put some numbers on the ash plank imports.  In this task I was aided by the International Trade in Goods section in the Central Statistics Office.  The pie chart below shows the 2021 origin of imported ash planks (by value of imports).  About 6.5% come from the Ukraine.  

It is important to note that this is ash plank imports for all uses and not just hurley-making.  The Minister made no mention of the United States.  If we presume that she was well informed by her department officials then the planks coming from the US are not for hurley-making.  Maybe it is an issue of quality.

The issue of quality was mentioned in the Canning Hurleys statement and the PQ from Sean Sherlock.  Maybe the US ash is not of sufficient quality for hurley-making.  Or maybe the quality and, therefore, the price are too high for hurley-making.  If the quality of US ash is not appropriate then the importance of the Ukrainian imports increases dramatically.  If the quality of the US ash is appropriate then there is less cause for concern.  Someone who saw the above chart suggested, tongue-in-cheek, that we might try to persuade (Irish) American President Joe Biden to make more ash available to Ireland in the way the US is releasing some of the US energy stock piles.

By David Duffy - Lecturer in Economics at Ulster University
 
The 61st edition of the Itzulia Basque Country takes place on the roads of Northern Spain this week, the first week of April.  It is one of Spain’s great cycle races.  The competition takes place over six days and attracts the world’s top cyclists. The Itzulia is one of Spain’s most prestigious and prized cycle races following Spain’s Grand Tour, La Vuelta Ciclista a España.  The only other Spanish stage race with a World Tour ranking is the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya.
 
Given the prestige of this race it is remarkable that four Spanish riders, competing for second ranking teams, known as Pro Tour teams, threw away the opportunity of a career on the roads of the Basque Country on the first road race stage.  Their folly was a failure to take advantage of the benefits of cooperation.
 
Cycle races often follow a typical pattern and this stage of Itzulia Basque Country started out no different.  In the early stages of a race individual riders typically attack the main peloton to ‘breakaway’ and gain a lead.  These attackers will hope to join forces with other attacking riders to form a breakaway group.  The physics of wind resistance in cycling means that cooperation in the breakaway group is vital early in the race to ensure energy can be conserved and a distance can be put between the breakaway and the peloton.  In this early phase riders take turns at the front, sharing the time in the full force of the wind.  At some point cooperation must turn to competition in the battle for the prize of race victory.  The clash between cooperation and competition gives rise to fascinating strategic interactions in breakaways.
 
The strategic interaction between breakaway group members can result in the classic economics problem of the ‘free rider’.  In the breakaway, free riding may take the form of blatantly sitting at the back of the group and not taking a turn to share the workload at the front.  A cyclist behaving this way might be referred to as a ‘wheel scrubber’ or a ‘wheel sucker’.  More subtly, a breakaway rider might free ride by ‘glass cranking’.  Glass cranking refers to a cyclist who makes it look like they are pedalling very hard but really, they are pedalling softly, as if their pedals are attached to glass cranks.
 
On stage two of the Itzulia Basque Country, the four-man breakaway group were successful in breaking free from the peloton after the first kilometre of racing.  Their optimal strategy now was to cooperate to ensure they maintained a gap to the finish line, a hilly 207km away.  The cooperation in the breakaway resulted in the four riders gaining a maximum advantage of almost 6 minutes over the peloton, with just under 80km of racing to the finish.  This is not a time to stop cooperating as the peloton will speed up in the later part of the race and the breakaway riders will suffer increased fatigue.  Indeed, the decline in the time gap from this point on is testament to these factors.
 
With around 13 km to go, the day was looking promising for the breakaway group.  They still had a gap of just over 2 minutes and some downhill sections to the finish line.  At this stage the breakaway were in with a real chance of staying clear of the peloton.  Continued joint effort and cooperation would give them a one in 4 chance of taking victory.  Failure to cooperate at this stage was likely to see them get caught by the peloton and their chances of victory would be almost nil.  Unfortunately, cooperation broke down.  In commentary, the recently retired rider, Nicholas Roche, frustratingly watched the crazy, unbelievable behaviour of the breakaway.  They were throwing away a potential career defining World Tour victory.
 
Cooperation broke down due to the free rider problem.  The free riding at this stage was of the more blatant type, with just one rider refusing to come to the front and take a turn.  Consequently, this was to result in group cooperation to visibly break down.  Words were being exchanged and arms were flailing as the riders sat up and even stopped pedalling to look at one another.
 
While three of the four were arguing and looking at one another, the fourth rider Ruiz, tried to lead by example by keeping the pace going.  The others weren’t even paying attention to him, as he simply rode steady leaving them behind.  It didn’t take long for the other three realised Ruiz was getting away.  They quickly started riding hard again but cooperation was still lacking.  Despite a valiant solo effort, the odds were now staked against Ruiz staying ahead of the fast chasing peloton.  The peloton shattered Ruiz’s dream by catching him with just 400 meters to go.
 
A once in a lifetime opportunity was certainly lost to the breakaway group of four.  After such a strong effort earlier in the day, the opportunity was squandered due to uncooperative behaviour.  If only the free rider knew what damage his uncooperative behaviour was to have on his, and the breakaway’s chances.

By John Considine

Last Saturday's National Hurling League final between Cork and Waterford brought an end to the competition that is viewed as the GAA's second most important national title.  In terms of the GAA finances, the League is important for County Boards as explained in the second chapter of Michael Moynihan's book GAAconomics.  The chapter is titled 'The Great Secret Springtime Revenue Generator'.  One of the advantages of the League for County Boards is its "fixity of fixtures".  When the book was published, counties were only guaranteed two games in the premier competition.  Since the book was published, there has been the introduction of a "Summertime Revenue Generator" in terms of a round-robin format to the provincial hurling championship.  This doubles the number of guaranteed games for each county.  Interrupted by the pandemic for a couple of years, the round-robin format returns this year.

The change of the season is also seen in the travel patterns of the supporters.  Like migrating birds, the hurling supporters tend to travel north in the summer.  The Cork-Waterford game was held in Semple Stadium, Thurles.  The latter stages of the All-Ireland championship tend to be held in Dublin.  Since 1937, every senior All-Ireland hurling final has been held in Croke Park with the exception of the Centenary Final in 1984.  By contrast, only three of the hurling league finals have been held in Croke Park since 1992.
 
The hurling fan will wonder what signals they can take from the League final about the forthcoming championship.  Looking at the similarities between the League final and the All-Ireland finals since 1975 might suggest that Waterford's recent league title is a sign of things to come.  Between 1975 and the end of the century there were only three winners of the League and All-Ireland double.  Since 2001, there has been nine double winners (Kilkenny on six occasions, and one double each for Galway, Limerick, and Tipperary).  That is 45% of the time (ignoring the unplayed final from last year).  Waterford fans might also look to the fact that Galway's 2017 springtime success was followed by their first senior All-Ireland in three decades.