The impact of uncertainty on fan interest surrounding multiple outcomes in Open European Football Leagues

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) James Reade, University of Reading; Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio, University of Navarra

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
Replication			04/10/2025 03:00:PM

Project Citation:

Reade, James, and Garcia-del-Barrio, Pedro. The impact of uncertainty on fan interest surrounding multiple outcomes in Open European Football Leagues. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2025-04-10. https://doi.org/10.3886/E206843V1

Project Description

Summary: This paper introduces a hitherto unused source of information to evaluate the importance of uncertainty in driving demand for particular types of entertainment events. We use web searches via Google, and consider various dimensions of uncertainty of outcome in sporting events. Most saliently, we consider whether the complete removal of uncertainty surrounding the winner of a competition, something that often happens before European football leagues have completed, reduces interest. We find that the decrease in interest is significant, but that it is mitigated by the existence of multiple objectives (secondary prizes), such as qualifying for European competitions and avoiding relegation, which expands the fan interest in these leagues. We conclude by affirming that such a diversified structure of competition, replete with an open structure of promotion and relegation, is desirable in the context of league competitions such as those in Europe that do not have a prominent play-off system to conclude the season.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: Sport; entertainment; uncertainty

Geographic Coverage: England, Spain, Italy, France and Germany

Time Period(s): 8/1/2004 – 6/30/2023 (All football seasons between 2004 and 2023)

Data Type(s): observational data

Methodology

Sampling: Our sample is the population of football matches in five elite competitions in Europe between August 2004 and June 2023.

Collection Mode(s): web scraping

Unit(s) of Observation: Weeks of football seasons

Geographic Unit: A country's top football league competition

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Published Versions

V1 [2025-04-10]

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