Soccernomics: Why England Loses, Why Germany and Brazil Win, and Why the U.S., Japan, Australia, ...
Why do England lose? Why does Scotland suck? Why doesn’t America dominate the sport internationally...and why do the Germans play with such an effi...
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Aug 29, 2011
James
rated it: 
Interesting take on lots of stuff about soccer, and I learned a bunch of stuff, but I think some of the conclusions are flat-out wrong.
I think the authors tried to draw too many conclusions from a relatively small amount of knowledge of baseball and football. Many lessons have been learned since Moneyball (defense is valuable), and there's a lot more knowledge about football (running backs, not so much) than what was stated.
One chapter tried to argue that the NFL has no mo More...
I think the authors tried to draw too many conclusions from a relatively small amount of knowledge of baseball and football. Many lessons have been learned since Moneyball (defense is valuable), and there's a lot more knowledge about football (running backs, not so much) than what was stated.
One chapter tried to argue that the NFL has no mo More...
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Jul 26, 2011
Matti
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Simon Kuperin ja Stefan Szymanskin "Why England Lose: and Other Curious Football Phenomena Explained" (HarperCollins, 2009) on kiinnostava matka jalkapallon ja tilastojen maailmaan. Parivaljakon tarkoituksena on tarkastella erilaisia kuningaspeliin liittyviä, yleisesti totuuksina pidettyjä väittämiä ja uskomuksia, sekä tutkia erilaisiin tilastoihin turvautuen mahtavatko ne pitää lainkaan paikkaansa.
Kuperi ja Szymanski käsittelevät kirjassa mm. Englannin alisuorittamista (mitä More...
Kuperi ja Szymanski käsittelevät kirjassa mm. Englannin alisuorittamista (mitä More...
Mar 14, 2011
Michael
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Inspired by Levitt's Freakonomics, Soccernomics is yet another book about ... wait ... it's the first book that tries to datamine everything about soccer (ahm, football.) Two authors with affinity for football and statistics have embarked in the eternal game of showing that you can prove anything you want with unverified data and faulty methods. Much as in the case of Freakonomics, I disliked the results: using the method of this work (regression of multiple rather thin and shaky datasets), you
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Apr 17, 2010
Caleb
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This is a book in the Freakonomics, Moneyball genre, and it is quite good. These guys have a strong mastery of the sports end plus the math to back it up. They certainly make some great points about overpaying for veterans and the lack of professionalism in managing.
Though I suppose a good thing, I had my quibbles. It's another book claiming there is no more parity in the NFL than in the Premier League and top soccer, and that's nonsense. The same few teams win every year in socc More...
Though I suppose a good thing, I had my quibbles. It's another book claiming there is no more parity in the NFL than in the Premier League and top soccer, and that's nonsense. The same few teams win every year in socc More...
Apr 14, 2010
Francis
rated it:
I’ll be honest I saw the review
“A blend of Freakanomics and Fever Pitch, bringing suprising economic analysis on the world’s most popular sport… a thught-provoking, often amysing read –Bloomberg News“
trumpeted on the cover of this book and I instinctively knew it would be a chore to like it. I quite enjoyed reading Fever Pitch and the less I say about Freakanomics the better. As with Freakanomics *sigh* it is puzzling if one is expected to read this as a scholar or as a popul More...
“A blend of Freakanomics and Fever Pitch, bringing suprising economic analysis on the world’s most popular sport… a thught-provoking, often amysing read –Bloomberg News“
trumpeted on the cover of this book and I instinctively knew it would be a chore to like it. I quite enjoyed reading Fever Pitch and the less I say about Freakanomics the better. As with Freakanomics *sigh* it is puzzling if one is expected to read this as a scholar or as a popul More...
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Jan 20, 2010
Daniel
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Soccernomics is a statistical study of the world’s most popular sport in the vein of Steven Levitt’s bestseller Freakonomics. Authors Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski delve into soccer by abandoning all conventional wisdom about the sport and studying it strictly by the numbers. Because of their data-heavy approach, the majority of the book focuses on European soccer, because it is from European sources that their findings are most reliable.
The book is framed around several questio More...
The book is framed around several questio More...
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Mar 12, 2011
Damon
rated it: 
Soccernomics is done in the style of "Freakanomics," but with a sports writer's eye for details and story. Having studied Statistics and Data Analysis, I know that all data and surveys results must be taken with a grain of salt. Although, the writers do have a persuasive arguement for how economics and location, strongly effect why certain countries continually do well in international competitions, and others continue to struggle.
One particular chapter I liked, discusse More...
One particular chapter I liked, discusse More...
Nov 30, 2011
Doreen
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This book gets a qualified five stars: if you don't care for international sports, or if popular economics holds no interest for you, then you probably won't care for Soccernomics. But if you, like I, have a fondness for The Professor (a.k.a Le Professeur a.k.a Arsene Wenger) because he is pretty much the living embodiment of the intersection between sports and economics, then you will love this book, too. Unsurprisingly, Wenger is lauded as one of Soccernomics' heroes, alongside Guus Hiddink, w
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Dec 23, 2010
Johanneskim
rated it: 
I do not know why Simon Kuper is regarded as one of soccer's most authoritative writers. His knowledge of German football is definetely limited. It seems to me that he takes data to try to prove his biased pre-formulated opinion. For example: Several facts he misstated about my hometown team. We are not in a small metropolitan area. Next to us are Düsseldorf and Cologne, very well connected. He mentions that we spend most of the decade (from 2009) in 2d division. That is not true. It was two yea
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Jun 12, 2010
Ryan Patrick
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The first few chapters were quite enlightening and engaging. Some of the later chapters didn't capture my attention as well - the questions the authors asked weren't all that interesting and their statistical analysis lacked a sense that they were using good numbers and in the right way. For example, I'm just not convinced that the number of international games a country has played equates to a good measure of 'experience' in any meaningful sense. Playing a bunch of friendlies against podunk opp
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Jun 06, 2011
Christopher
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Excellent football book, whose premise is to provide statistical background to why certain teams do well and others do not. The authors provide 3 factors why certain countries do well; tradition, wealth and population and guess what – England actually do as well as statistically they should be expected to do. This provide ammunition to my argument that the English media overhypes the team’s chances and should learn a little humility. Other surprising revelations included that World Cups actually
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Jan 05, 2010
Benjamin
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Think of this book less as an illustration of how soccer works, and more as an introduction to what economists actually do, using soccer as a good illustration. Game theory comes to life when examined from the perspective of a player taking a penalty kick. The art of quantifying benefits to a community from taking a certain corse of action is demonstrated by looking at what a community actually gets from hosting a World Cup. And the challenge of creating a good model that will predict success
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Jul 16, 2011
Arjun
rated it:
The Freakonomics-esque approach to tackling the global soccer phenomenon worked, but I have contentions with the book and authors’ premises. I like books like Super Crunchers and Freakonomics that apply statistics and models to real-world situations. I enjoyed this for that same kind of readability and fascination, but it is not as strong as those books.
It is mentioned early by some English players that it is odd for a Manchester United vs. Liverpool rivalry not to have Liverpool o More...
It is mentioned early by some English players that it is odd for a Manchester United vs. Liverpool rivalry not to have Liverpool o More...
Jan 18, 2010
Matt
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Soccernomics is a fantastic look at a soccer from a completely different point-of-view than you're probably used to seeing. Using statistical techniques like regression and massive amounts of old match results and other data related to both the classic and modern game of soccer, Kuper and Szymanski bring a new insight to how we think of the beautiful game. There are sections on national teams, club teams, and fans, and they all bring a style similar to Freakonomics and its look at different popu
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Jan 25, 2010
Erik
rated it:
Every four years, with the coming of the World Cup, many new soccer books are released. The authors and publishers no doubt are hoping to capitalize on the sport's exposure to push sales. Soccernomics is not for the casual fan. The book delves very deeply into statistics behind the game. There is a lot of discussion of mathematical regression and very little anecdotal evidence, such as is seen in Jonathan Foerr's "How Soccer Explains the World." Also, the book focuses exclusively
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Aug 20, 2009
Rob
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A longer version of the following review can be accessed at: Why England Lose
I must confess that I entered upon the reading of Why England Lose with a heavy heart. Although I enjoyed the playful tone and sharp conclusions of Freakonomics, I found it to be a somewhat glib volume that exercised extreme selectivity with its data in order to “prove” its points. For the world of football to be afforded the same treatment by an economics profession that has largely lost touch with the real More...
I must confess that I entered upon the reading of Why England Lose with a heavy heart. Although I enjoyed the playful tone and sharp conclusions of Freakonomics, I found it to be a somewhat glib volume that exercised extreme selectivity with its data in order to “prove” its points. For the world of football to be afforded the same treatment by an economics profession that has largely lost touch with the real More...
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May 05, 2011
James
rated it:
This book styles itself early on as a soccer version of Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, this is an ambitious target, that frankly it doesn't quite hit. This is more in the line of Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything for soccer. Still a very interesting read. I think that there are some arguments that are based on pretty thin factual evidence, but most are very well thought out and researched. One caveat is that the book is very focused on Bri
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Nov 29, 2010
Mat
rated it:
This book aims to use econometrics to analyze trends in football and show how common perception is inherently flawed, whether when iot pertains to which teams should win, which players should succeed or where they should be from.
The book tackles a variety of topics, but not all will grasp your attention. Some were truely interesting, namely the ones regarding clubs' transfer philosophy and what makes expatriate players succeed, or analyzing the history of european clubs to explain th More...
The book tackles a variety of topics, but not all will grasp your attention. Some were truely interesting, namely the ones regarding clubs' transfer philosophy and what makes expatriate players succeed, or analyzing the history of european clubs to explain th More...
Mar 30, 2010
Alicia
rated it:
Marcelo and I got into a screaming fit last night over this book. I was trying to tell him some things that this book said and he didn't believe me. And so he started going off about how anyone can put ANYTHING in a book, and how you can't always believe what books say. (I think he was supposed to be talking about the Internet, but whatever). I think he was offended when I said that English Soccer owners run their clubs very unlike Americans. So the English almost never make money, but the Ameri
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Jun 26, 2010
Luke
rated it:
Some fascinating number crunching for soccer fans and sociologists alike. A very thoughtful dissection, from a statistical and numerical standpoint, about how sports and society interact. I'd go three and a half stars (some passages are a bit dry, but overall it's very interesting), except there are a few moments where you wonder how thoroughly the accuracy has been checked. For example, when talking about Field of Dreams, they identify that unforgettable mantra as "If you build it, HE will
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Jul 27, 2011
Matthew
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Why England Lose is interesting and sometimes absorbing, especially the first half of the book when the authors incisively lampoon the way football clubs are run, but its second half is a little speculative, seeming to reach a conclusion and then working out stats that justify that conclusion. Any contradictions in the authors' reasoning are either glibly dismissed or simply ignored and I found its tone hectoring and smug towards the end. It is definitely worth reading, but this is no Moneyball
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Jan 19, 2010
Brian
rated it:
The quote on the cover sums it up: "A blend of Freakonomics and Fever Pitch, bringing surprising economic analysis to bear on the world's most popular sport." - Bloomberg News
The chapter on penalty kicks was outstanding, some others not so much.
A lot of the best parts of the book were seeming non-sequiturs relative to the primary push of the authors. Along with the question of penalty kicks, the authors whetted the appetite of the reader by touching on topics of di More...
The chapter on penalty kicks was outstanding, some others not so much.
A lot of the best parts of the book were seeming non-sequiturs relative to the primary push of the authors. Along with the question of penalty kicks, the authors whetted the appetite of the reader by touching on topics of di More...
Mar 19, 2010
Todd
rated it:
A Must Read
This book is required reading for anyone who calls them self a soccer fan. Granted a good majority of the book focuses on England and English football however there is still much to learn even if you've never seen an EPL match. Kuper and Szymanski's insights on the changing nature of international football and international economics make for an informative and thought provoking read. While I am still a fan of "going with your gut" when it comes to making deci More...
This book is required reading for anyone who calls them self a soccer fan. Granted a good majority of the book focuses on England and English football however there is still much to learn even if you've never seen an EPL match. Kuper and Szymanski's insights on the changing nature of international football and international economics make for an informative and thought provoking read. While I am still a fan of "going with your gut" when it comes to making deci More...
Jun 07, 2011
Nate
rated it:
I had previously read How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization by Franklin Foer. In that book, Soccer is used to explain globalization. I thought this book would use soccer to explain global economics. This is the diametric opposite of that - it uses economics and statistical models to explain soccer. None the less, it is a great book. The authors have examined a mountains of data to illustrate the past,present, and future of global soccer. The potential dryness of st
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Nov 01, 2011
Tbueno
rated it:
I like the way it mixes economics with soccer, gathering tons of data and reveling unexpected facts about Football.
I gave it a 3 stars because it is too England centered. I understand that the authors are more familiar with UK clubs and it is easier to get statistical data about Britain football, but it lacks a world context in a lot of the explanations.
Is that possible write about football without barely mention Brazil? A lot of the ideas described in the book simply don't More...
I gave it a 3 stars because it is too England centered. I understand that the authors are more familiar with UK clubs and it is easier to get statistical data about Britain football, but it lacks a world context in a lot of the explanations.
Is that possible write about football without barely mention Brazil? A lot of the ideas described in the book simply don't More...
Mar 15, 2010
Lloyd
rated it:
I am the layman when it comes to economics, so I approached this with an open mind. The book was a gift, but I am pleased to have read it, the largely global perspective of the book whetting my appetite for this year's World Cup. The journo / economist authorship works, and the book is written well with an easy, almost anecdotal style at times.
The authors' selection of stats might be questioned. At one point they talk of the old economics joke of a stat man locking himself in a dark More...
The authors' selection of stats might be questioned. At one point they talk of the old economics joke of a stat man locking himself in a dark More...
Nov 24, 2009
Gus
rated it:
Kuper's follow-up to his brilliant Soccer Against the Enemy, co-written with economist Stefan Szymanski, is a thoughtful and often cheeky examination on how trends within the sport can be explained through economics. Three sections in this book are particularly brilliant: the chapter on how penalty kicks trends discovered by a Basque game theorist nearly won Chelsea the 2008 Champions League title against their bitter rivals Manchester United (United won in a memorable final) reads like a sly po
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Mar 07, 2010
Sal
rated it:
Certainly one of the most enjoyable non-fiction books I've read in a long time. While economics buffs might not be heartily impressed with that aspect of the book, fans of soccer (European soccer in particular), who are this book's primary target, will find a lot to love here. I was fascinated by many of the arguments/theories laid out by the authors, particularly the chapters about why England never wins major tournaments, and the specific ways in which hosting a big event like World Cup ben
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Sep 23, 2011
John
rated it:
Well, it's not Moneyball for football (UK & Europe). It starts as a good read, with some humour and some nice expositions of football topics, but the later chapters get bogged down in rather pointless discussions about which countries like football the most, and variations on this theme: once was enough. The later chapters felt like fillers to pad out the material to book length.[return][return]One day a data-savvy writer will spend a year with Arsene Wenger or a Dutch manager who uses Prozone t
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May 11, 2010
Adrienne
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A fascinating read on using principles of statistics and economics to understand club and international soccer, Soccernomics covers the transfer market, the fans and their psychological status, and which countries love soccer most and which countries are likely to win future World Cups. With that same tournament starting at the beginning of June, now was the perfect time to read a book on soccer.
Simon Kuper's book is interesting and well-written, even if it has a little more math in More...
Simon Kuper's book is interesting and well-written, even if it has a little more math in More...
