As is customary at this time of year, we will take our summer break and return on the 29th of July.

​We hope all our readers have a very enjoyable summer and enjoy Euro 2024.

By John Considine

Before there existed a 21st century movie called Fifty Shades of Gray, there existed a 20th century song Forty Shades of Green.  In recent years it seems that the shade of green that matters to the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) has changed.  The nationalistic green has faded and the colour of money has taken over (although it could be argued that green is no longer the colour of money).
 
During my early years, a GAA player found playing, or even attending, a “foreign” game could be banned from the GAA.  That rule was removed by the time I became a teenager.  The spread of television sets made a difference.  It was possible to watch the Irish national soccer side on our television screens and also watch highlights of English league club sides.  Monitoring and banning those watching foreign games seemed silly.  Half a century later, it was clear that the GAA had changed its focus to collecting revenue from watching television screens.  Like the other sporting organisations it sought to protect its assets from being listed on the government's free-to-air list.  The organisations claimed that nearly all their games were not of national importance.  The GAA then sold the broadcast rights to some of its games to Sky (a foreign broadcaster).  And, more recently, it has developed GAA Go to increase its revenue.
 
After the “ban” on playing and spectating at foreign games was removed, there remained a rule that banned members of the British Security forces from playing gaelic games and another rule that prohibited the playing of “foreign” games on GAA grounds.  Rules 21 and 42, respectively.
 
Rule 42 bit the dust when the home venue of the Irish rugby team was being redeveloped.  A combination of the two shades of green played a role.  Claims that the Irish national team might have to play their home games on foreign soil were used to appeal to nationalist sentiments.  Those who objected based on anti-British sentiment, and a fear that it would be a gateway to opening of other GAA grounds, were assured that it was only one ground that would be made available to the competing sporting organisations.  It was only Croke Park that would be used.  The other shade of green also played a role.  The monetary benefits to the development of gaelic games were also used to sway the vote.
 
But it is not just Croke Park.  Money also opened Pairc ui Chaoimh to other sports.  Having spent 800 years to break free of one political and monetary union, Ireland joined another one in 1973.  Political and monetary ties with Europe brought with it constraints.  One of those constraints are the rules around State Aid.  Whether it is a tax ruling for Apple based on one side of Cork city, or part funding a sport stadium on the other side of the city, there are conditions attached to the aid.  Paragraph 25 of State Aid SA.44439 says “As stated above, the CCB [Cork County Board] will rent out the PUiC's [Pairc ui Chaoimh] facilities to third parties to organise sporting and other commercial events. In such cases, the CCB will charge market-conform fees that are established on the basis of a market analysis (taking into account the fees normally payable for the use of similar infrastructure). This requirement will be included in the Letter of Offer for the proposed aid.”
 
Munster rugby have availed of the facilities.  But rugby always got an easier ride amongst GAA supporters because it was an all-island game.  Now, on July 12th, as those opposed to a united Ireland march in Northern Ireland, the GAA hopes that tens of thousands will march to Pairc ui Chaoimh to support the Irish national women’s soccer team.  Some, non-economists, will say that it is a sign that money is the root of all evil.
 
Only this week the GAA broadcast it support for economic evaluation methods by publishing a study on the economic impact of games (here).  Forty Shades of Green is associated with the appropriately named Mr Cash.  The economics of sport.

By Robbie Butler

It was with great sadness that we learned of the passing of Ross Booth last week. Many in the world of sports economics will have been familiar with Ross who was a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Economics at Monash University.

During his academic career Ross made several notable contributions to the literature. His clear passion for Australian Rules Football can be witnessed from his numerous peer reviewed papers in prestigious journal including Sport Management Review, Economic Record and Australian Economic Review, and a contribution to the Handbook on the Economics of Sport. Ross also branched outside of AFL and wrote on sports economics generally as well as a notable 2013 contribution to the Journal of Sports Economics exploring competitive balance in Formula One, a sport largely overlooked in the field at the time. This paper has already been cited more than 50 times.

Only last August Ross made the trip to visit us in Cork to attend all five days of the 14th Annual European Sport Economics Association Conference. He was immediately popular with attendees and organisers, and spent the first evening of the conference with us at a League of Ireland cup match. We chatted about sport and he told me he played some Aussie Rules when he was younger. Little did we know, nor did he mention during his time here, how famous he was back home. It is only in recent days that we have started to understand the role he played in AFL circles and the contributions he made to the sport.

We have lost a great colleague and academic. The small community of sports’ economists is a lesser place now that Ross has gone. ​Some tributes to Ross from his homeland can be found here and here.

By John Considine

Last Friday, Ireland picked up a gold medal in the European Athletics Championships.  It was in the mixed 4x400m relay.  A relatively rare event – even if a gold medal in a blue ribbon event was to follow two days later.
 
Yesterday, there was another rare event in a different mixed competition.  Linn Grant won the Volvo Car Scandinavian Mixed Golf tournament.  She had become the first woman to win on the European Tour by winning the same event two years earlier.  While male and female competitors play off different tees, Grant’s victory is a significant one (although likely to be obscured by the collapse of the competitor who leading going into day four.)  In Golfonomics, Stephen Shmanske suggested that women would probably earn more by competing directly against men – something he pointed out was not prohibited.
 
Yet, when it comes to mixed events, it is dressage that provides the most fruitful ground for comparisons and hypothesis testing.  Men and women compete on an equal footing and the competition is judges by both men and women.  This combination provided Anna Sandberg with the data to examine the in-group biases in judging of performances. In a 2018 paper in the Economic Journal, Sandberg found no evidence of in-group bias on sex grounds.  However, there was in-group bias when it came to the nationality of the judging panel.

The growth of mixed competitions is likely to aid further research.

​By David Butler
We saw a good example of the financial costs of not qualifying for major international tournaments on our tv screens in Ireland last week. A standout feature of the Ireland vs Hungary friendly (exhibition) match was the partly full stadium and almost completely empty stand behind the goa l- admittedly where away fans often occupy.

The FAI claimed to have sold 37,000 tickets. The official attendance figure was 29,424. At about €30 a ticket the entry revenue was likely somewhere between ~€880k and €1.1m, depending on the truth of the claim and whether the circa 7,500 no-shows were charged or how they were charged (may have been corporate tickets etc.).

If the Irish were travelling to Germany, I would expect attendances to be higher in the last Friendly match. As a child I was one of the 42,652 that watched Ireland lose to Nigeria in a friendly before World Cup 2002. There were similar sell-outs in the old Lansdowne road for the Russia, Denmark and USA friendlies.  Moving forward to 2012, there was 37,100 in the Aviva Stadium for a Friendly against Bosnia before Euro 2012. Pre Euro 2016, 42,000 turned up to see the Netherlands.  

Based on reported attendances figures (not ticket sales), I would ballpark that not qualifying for the Euros resulted in lost revenue to the tune of about €300k for the Hungary match. At a senior international level it’s a results business, maybe with more scrappy 2-1 wins, the FAI would likely see better financial results. 

By David Butler

Provisional squads have been named for the upcoming European Championships. As is usually the case, there are controversial selection decisions for the biggest nations who have an abundant talent pool to select from.

A recurring discussion point over the years is whether players for the big nations are not being selected for their national team because they are not playing in their domestic league. Fikayo Tomori (English but contracted to AC Milan) and Perdo Porro (Spanish but contracted to Tottenham) are two recent examples of omissions where I think no questions would have been asked if they were included. I wonder whether there is a career penalty - in terms of international caps accrued - from playing abroad ?

The provincial squads for the Big-5 nations are composed as follows : Germany – 22% players outside Bundesliga, Spain 28% outside La Liga, Italy, 10% outside Serie A, England 6% outside the Premier League and France 68% outside of Lique 1. The French are quite different, and usually are when it comes to a lot of Big-5 comparisons, it often makes me think if it should be the Big-4. Maybe this is a measure of domestic league strength when we have free movement of talent. 

By John Considine

Knee injuries, and particularly ACL injuries, are the curse of Ladies Gaelic Football.  A 2023 paper by Siobhan O’Connor and colleagues has the following two sentences. “Knee injuries amounted to 70.0% of the Injury Fund's expenses. ACL injuries specifically comprised 7.8% of claims and accounted for 46.7% of the Injury Fund (€2,896,286.56).”  These finding are consistent with the other literature cited in this Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport paper.
 
Usually when one encounters an acronym such as ACL it is accompanied by the words it refers to, i.e. Anterior Cruciate Ligament.  It is informative that the authors of the paper, like myself in the opening sentence above, did not feel the need to explain that ACL stands for Anterior Cruciate Ligament.  Readers know ACL spells trouble for the player.  This paper provides some cost data on the issue.
 
The paper uses data from the Ladies Gaelic Football Association’s injury fund for the period 2012-2020.  The payments are funded from membership fees.  Payments from the fund are made for verified claims made by players who do not have their own personal insurance or for excess expenses where a player have their own insurance.  It means that the cost of ACL injuries is much larger.