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Soccernomics (2022 World Cup Edition): Why European Men and American Women Win and Billionaire Owners Are Destined to Lose
Written with an economist's brain and a soccer writer's skill, Soccernomics applies high-powered analytical tools to everyday soccer topics
Why doesn't the United States dominate soccer internationally? And how can it? Which is the best soccer nation on Earth? Who has the most passionate fans? What impact does soccer have on suicide rates? Which sport will dominate the Earth—NFL or the English Premier League? Why are the people who run soccer clubs so dumb?
These are some of the questions every soccer fanatic has asked themselves. Soccernomics answers them all. Written with an economist's brain and a soccer writer's skill, it applies high-powered analytical tools to everyday soccer topics, looking at data and revealing counterintuitive truths about the world's most loved game. It all adds up to a revolutionary new way of looking at soccer that could change the way the game is played.
Why doesn't the United States dominate soccer internationally? And how can it? Which is the best soccer nation on Earth? Who has the most passionate fans? What impact does soccer have on suicide rates? Which sport will dominate the Earth—NFL or the English Premier League? Why are the people who run soccer clubs so dumb?
These are some of the questions every soccer fanatic has asked themselves. Soccernomics answers them all. Written with an economist's brain and a soccer writer's skill, it applies high-powered analytical tools to everyday soccer topics, looking at data and revealing counterintuitive truths about the world's most loved game. It all adds up to a revolutionary new way of looking at soccer that could change the way the game is played.
428 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2009
1209 people are currently reading
22383 people want to read
About the author
Simon Kuper
59 books377 followersSimon Kuper is a journalist for the Financial Times in England. He was born in Uganda of South African parents and moved to the Netherlands as a child. He studied History and German at Oxford University, and attended Harvard University as a Kennedy Scholar. He has written for The Times, Observer, Guardian and Le Monde, and also writes regularly for the Spectator and Dutch newspapers.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 922 reviews
April 2, 2012
As soccer being my favorite sport, I was really hoping to like this a lot more than I actually did; and it did have some really interesting parts to it. A big problem it had in fact was it took way to long to actually get to those good parts. If it had kept in my favorite sections and cut the length of the book in half, I would be giving this book 5 stars easily. I can't complain too bad though, because I did get some enjoyment out of it and I did get some really interesting facts as well.
December 31, 2011
For a book that tries to equate MoneyBall to soccer it completely misses the point. It picks and chooses facts, wraps it in very basic stats to make it sound like they have done some work and maths and present there theories as fact which don't stand up to any scrutiny.
I have never been so relived that the last 10% of the book was acknowledgements and and index.
That said the passages about OL was interesting but the only thing I really took from it was under 23 is an ideal age to buy a player.
I have never been so relived that the last 10% of the book was acknowledgements and and index.
That said the passages about OL was interesting but the only thing I really took from it was under 23 is an ideal age to buy a player.
July 4, 2015
Fascinating use of statistics to disprove the prevailing social mindset on how football functions, a real easy and enjoyable read.
Quick answers for you:
Why doesn’t America dominate the sport internationally? Actually it's because they still don't care too much and haven't imported enough European knowledge.
Why England loses? They're actually better than they ought to be.
Why Australia is destined to become the kings of the world's most popular sport? That's a lie designed to sell copies of the book in Australia. Which is disappointing because I'd like to be from the home of the world champions of football.
Quick answers for you:
Why doesn’t America dominate the sport internationally? Actually it's because they still don't care too much and haven't imported enough European knowledge.
Why England loses? They're actually better than they ought to be.
Why Australia is destined to become the kings of the world's most popular sport? That's a lie designed to sell copies of the book in Australia. Which is disappointing because I'd like to be from the home of the world champions of football.
September 11, 2015
Soccernomics = Freakanomics + Soccer.
If you loved Freakanomics Or If you like either Soccer or Economics, you will love Soccernomics.
If you loved Freakanomics Or If you like either Soccer or Economics, you will love Soccernomics.
January 10, 2016
As a recent (~last five years or so) fan of soccer beyond watching the US at the World Cup, and as someone who respects how insightful data analysis can help us see through what turns out to be weakly justified or even flatly erroneous received wisdom, this book should have been in my wheelhouse. And indeed, parts of it were. There are a lot of interesting points made here about a range of topics, like how, contra the complaints of supposedly beleaguered fans, England actually overperforms in international soccer relative to it's soccer history and demographics, how a common nativist argument (e.g., "there should be more English players in the Premier League") is misguided because it neglects how the collection of international stars who populate the EPL actually push England's EPL players to improve, and how the primary benefit of hosting a World Cup is not financial (as has become increasingly clear since they published just a couple years ago, hosting a World Cup or Olympics doesn't bring economic returns) but emotional (i.e., host countries, much more so than winning countries, tend to experience increased happiness after such events).
However, almost every chapter contains either a claim that is vastly overstated relative to the data that they have available to them, or contains a massive conceptual error. Overstating points may be slightly excusable, especially since their editors are probably forcing that kind of frame on a book meant for popular consumption rather than academic consideration, but I still don't find it completely excusable. What's unforgiveable, and what makes this book earn the lowest possible rating, is that the authors have a couple of grossly misused (because misunderstood) instances of trendy scientific ideas that makes it seem like they've only bothered learning about it from recent article in Wired, or skimming one of the books by the modern master of this kind of fluffy-pop-sci-writing weakness, Malcolm Gladwell.
Case in point: the second chapter is an extended argument for why soccer teams should maximize money spent on player salaries, and minimize money spent on transfer fees. That argument itself seems plausibly-supported. But they then try to figure out why one of their heroes of the chapter, Lyon, managed to come out of nowhere to win the French Ligue One for seven years through a policy of finding good players young and selling them while they still had value; basically they won because they were able to play the transfer market arbitrage game exceptionally well. The reason they give for their ability to do so well: the "wisdom of crowds", which they say Lyon had because instead of a single manager making personnel decisions, they had an entire five people get together to make those decisions. Anyone who has any knowledge of the theory of the wisdom of crowds knows that five experts sitting in a room is not a crowd! That's just a committee, an entity which sometimes works well by pooling ideas, and sometimes are even less effective than a single decision maker because focus is muddled. But they're not a crowd! The wisdom of crowds idea is that in *some* situations (guessing the weight of an ox at a fair is the classic example), with sufficiently diverse sets of people, the knowledge of large groups of people can get closer to the correct answer than the experts, because their collective errors in answering a question will tend to cancel each other out. It doesn't always work, especially in cases where later parts of the crowd can see what earlier parts of the crowd did, which can create an information cascade (since the later people intuit that the early folks were on to something, their own guesses can get skewed by whichever opinions randomly showed up first). (Side note: for authors who spend so much time talking about "knowledge networks" being the key that explains most of modern soccer, it's curious that they've apparently never considered another network phenomenon the concept of an information cascade, which is often the basis for the most obvious foolishness of the crowds results: market bubbles.) And it's almost certainly true that any real world application of using the opinion of actual crowds (i.e., the fan base) rather than modestly-sized committees to choose which players to sign will inevitably lead to signing big name, past-their-prime players for too much money. I have no problem believing that these five guys in Lyon were especially good at their job, using good Moneyball-ish principles to sign players at a time when other clubs were not, but there is nothing in what Lyon did that comes even close to seriously implementing wisdom from crowds, and any attempt to say otherwise is the result of rank amateurish thinking and research. While this error was the most egregious, there are similar conceptual errors sprinkled throughout this book that suggest that Kuper and Szymanski themselves need to broaden their own knowledge networks and read scholars and sources outside of their own narrow domains of interest (or at the very least, stop talking authoritatively about things they know almost nothing about).
However, almost every chapter contains either a claim that is vastly overstated relative to the data that they have available to them, or contains a massive conceptual error. Overstating points may be slightly excusable, especially since their editors are probably forcing that kind of frame on a book meant for popular consumption rather than academic consideration, but I still don't find it completely excusable. What's unforgiveable, and what makes this book earn the lowest possible rating, is that the authors have a couple of grossly misused (because misunderstood) instances of trendy scientific ideas that makes it seem like they've only bothered learning about it from recent article in Wired, or skimming one of the books by the modern master of this kind of fluffy-pop-sci-writing weakness, Malcolm Gladwell.
Case in point: the second chapter is an extended argument for why soccer teams should maximize money spent on player salaries, and minimize money spent on transfer fees. That argument itself seems plausibly-supported. But they then try to figure out why one of their heroes of the chapter, Lyon, managed to come out of nowhere to win the French Ligue One for seven years through a policy of finding good players young and selling them while they still had value; basically they won because they were able to play the transfer market arbitrage game exceptionally well. The reason they give for their ability to do so well: the "wisdom of crowds", which they say Lyon had because instead of a single manager making personnel decisions, they had an entire five people get together to make those decisions. Anyone who has any knowledge of the theory of the wisdom of crowds knows that five experts sitting in a room is not a crowd! That's just a committee, an entity which sometimes works well by pooling ideas, and sometimes are even less effective than a single decision maker because focus is muddled. But they're not a crowd! The wisdom of crowds idea is that in *some* situations (guessing the weight of an ox at a fair is the classic example), with sufficiently diverse sets of people, the knowledge of large groups of people can get closer to the correct answer than the experts, because their collective errors in answering a question will tend to cancel each other out. It doesn't always work, especially in cases where later parts of the crowd can see what earlier parts of the crowd did, which can create an information cascade (since the later people intuit that the early folks were on to something, their own guesses can get skewed by whichever opinions randomly showed up first). (Side note: for authors who spend so much time talking about "knowledge networks" being the key that explains most of modern soccer, it's curious that they've apparently never considered another network phenomenon the concept of an information cascade, which is often the basis for the most obvious foolishness of the crowds results: market bubbles.) And it's almost certainly true that any real world application of using the opinion of actual crowds (i.e., the fan base) rather than modestly-sized committees to choose which players to sign will inevitably lead to signing big name, past-their-prime players for too much money. I have no problem believing that these five guys in Lyon were especially good at their job, using good Moneyball-ish principles to sign players at a time when other clubs were not, but there is nothing in what Lyon did that comes even close to seriously implementing wisdom from crowds, and any attempt to say otherwise is the result of rank amateurish thinking and research. While this error was the most egregious, there are similar conceptual errors sprinkled throughout this book that suggest that Kuper and Szymanski themselves need to broaden their own knowledge networks and read scholars and sources outside of their own narrow domains of interest (or at the very least, stop talking authoritatively about things they know almost nothing about).
January 21, 2010
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 questions: Which country plays the best soccer? Which has the best fans? Who is destined to dominate the sport? Which countries play better than they should, and conversely, who underachieve? From here, the authors use game results, demographic studies, attendance statistics, often citing the UN Human Development index to correlate factors such as a country’s access to medical resources and its success on the turf.
In these investigations, many fun notions are unearthed. The authors discuss why England, the creator of soccer, isn’t dominating the field (a combination of a restrictive recruitment method, a shockingly dysfunctional business model amongst soccer clubs, and geographical isolation). They criticize soccer’s status quo, which prevents managers from hiring minority or female coaches, provide a wealth of charts to show which teams, despite the sizes of their home countries and experience on the international level, show promise (Georgia, Iraq, the Czech Republic). They also illustrate penalty kicks as a psychological treasure trove for the study of game theory. There’s also a chapter that discusses how hosting a large sporting event, such as the 2016 Olympics, can be economically damaging to a country but a boon to the happiness of its inhabitants.
It was only until the final chapter that the authors shared their analysis more equally with the rest of the world. I understand their reliance on Europe for most of the book – not only are their European statistics the most sound, but the continent is also the birthplace of the sport – but my personal bias would have liked more insight into Mexico and Central America. There was also a jarring chapter linking sports and suicide prevention that significantly slowed down the pace.
The book is framed around several questions: Which country plays the best soccer? Which has the best fans? Who is destined to dominate the sport? Which countries play better than they should, and conversely, who underachieve? From here, the authors use game results, demographic studies, attendance statistics, often citing the UN Human Development index to correlate factors such as a country’s access to medical resources and its success on the turf.
In these investigations, many fun notions are unearthed. The authors discuss why England, the creator of soccer, isn’t dominating the field (a combination of a restrictive recruitment method, a shockingly dysfunctional business model amongst soccer clubs, and geographical isolation). They criticize soccer’s status quo, which prevents managers from hiring minority or female coaches, provide a wealth of charts to show which teams, despite the sizes of their home countries and experience on the international level, show promise (Georgia, Iraq, the Czech Republic). They also illustrate penalty kicks as a psychological treasure trove for the study of game theory. There’s also a chapter that discusses how hosting a large sporting event, such as the 2016 Olympics, can be economically damaging to a country but a boon to the happiness of its inhabitants.
It was only until the final chapter that the authors shared their analysis more equally with the rest of the world. I understand their reliance on Europe for most of the book – not only are their European statistics the most sound, but the continent is also the birthplace of the sport – but my personal bias would have liked more insight into Mexico and Central America. There was also a jarring chapter linking sports and suicide prevention that significantly slowed down the pace.
November 29, 2022
Really great overview that could’ve done slightly more in attacking the status quo and billionaires hopeful future for soccer. The chapter on the Super Euro League is one of the best pieces I’ve read on the subject. Certainly a worthwhile read for people interested in the intersection of sports and economics.
August 29, 2011
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 more parity than the EPL. It seems pretty clear to me that a single game of football is less random than a single game of soccer (higher scoring means less randomness), and this is somewhat counteracted by the shortened NFL season. However, I think a significant advantage of football is that any team is likely to have both good and bad years over a 20 year period. EPL (and MLB) don't really have this, with a good number of constant winners and constant losers. The book then tried to say that people actually prefer the leagues with constant winners, but I was not convinced.
The better chapters showed that soccer in short tournaments is really about luck; that teams showed racism in the past in salaries but this has gone away; that teams should spend more on off-the-field stuff for both young players and recently-transferred players.
Hopefully there are other people studying soccer that are publishing their results, I'd love to see more of this.
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 more parity than the EPL. It seems pretty clear to me that a single game of football is less random than a single game of soccer (higher scoring means less randomness), and this is somewhat counteracted by the shortened NFL season. However, I think a significant advantage of football is that any team is likely to have both good and bad years over a 20 year period. EPL (and MLB) don't really have this, with a good number of constant winners and constant losers. The book then tried to say that people actually prefer the leagues with constant winners, but I was not convinced.
The better chapters showed that soccer in short tournaments is really about luck; that teams showed racism in the past in salaries but this has gone away; that teams should spend more on off-the-field stuff for both young players and recently-transferred players.
Hopefully there are other people studying soccer that are publishing their results, I'd love to see more of this.
January 18, 2010
As I salivate over the obscenely large television I might be purchasing just in time for this year's world cup, I was really hoping this book would give me an overview of the global soccer business. Instead, it was a disconnected series of not-that-interesting anecdotes, with lots of statistics, some of which weren't bad, but none that exciting. These guys could have used Michael Lewis as an editor -- he could have maybe spun the book into decent shape.
March 31, 2010
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 Americans do. The book wasn't praising the U.S. It was just pointing out a statistical fact!! But it really riled him up.
So don't read this book and then get into arguing fight with your football fanatic of a husband. This book was written by some statisticians. So if you don't like statistics, you probably won't like it. But if you can remember back to that one class of stats that you took in college, you'll be just fine. They take it pretty easy on the readers. And they have stats about all sorts of things when it comes to the game. Who under-performs? Who over-performs? Who is the next up and coming team to watch? Does soccer effect suicide rates? Why do people think that good soccer players grow up poor? Is that really true? And why do countries want to host World Cups if it doesn't make them any money?
This book talks about all of that and it also includes quite a bit about soccer history and the history of the leagues in Europe. Just so you know, it mostly focuses on the Premiere League and other European Leagues. (We happen to be big fans of both in this house, so I wasn't a fish out of water.) If you don't like European soccer, then again, this book is not for you. I found it very interesting, though. However, I tend to find lots of things interesting that other find boring.
A must read for soccer fans
Oh, and you know how the English make fun of us for saying "Soccer" when they say "football?" Well, where do you think we got that word? We didn't invent the game or name it ourselves. Actually, the book points out that the ENGLISH gave it that name and called it that for almost 100 years. And then it fell out of favor. So they started calling it football and then mocking all other that called it soccer!! SO STOP MAKING FUN OF US BRITISH!! YOU TAUGHT IT TO US IN THE FIRST PLACE. Cheeky Brits.
So don't read this book and then get into arguing fight with your football fanatic of a husband. This book was written by some statisticians. So if you don't like statistics, you probably won't like it. But if you can remember back to that one class of stats that you took in college, you'll be just fine. They take it pretty easy on the readers. And they have stats about all sorts of things when it comes to the game. Who under-performs? Who over-performs? Who is the next up and coming team to watch? Does soccer effect suicide rates? Why do people think that good soccer players grow up poor? Is that really true? And why do countries want to host World Cups if it doesn't make them any money?
This book talks about all of that and it also includes quite a bit about soccer history and the history of the leagues in Europe. Just so you know, it mostly focuses on the Premiere League and other European Leagues. (We happen to be big fans of both in this house, so I wasn't a fish out of water.) If you don't like European soccer, then again, this book is not for you. I found it very interesting, though. However, I tend to find lots of things interesting that other find boring.
A must read for soccer fans
Oh, and you know how the English make fun of us for saying "Soccer" when they say "football?" Well, where do you think we got that word? We didn't invent the game or name it ourselves. Actually, the book points out that the ENGLISH gave it that name and called it that for almost 100 years. And then it fell out of favor. So they started calling it football and then mocking all other that called it soccer!! SO STOP MAKING FUN OF US BRITISH!! YOU TAUGHT IT TO US IN THE FIRST PLACE. Cheeky Brits.
May 27, 2017
This book is the Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything of football. The book explores common questions in football and uses data to dispel many mythical notions.
Why don't England win more often? Who are the best fans? What is the best business model in club football? What is the link between medical facilities in a nation and its on-field success? Why aren't there more Champions League winners from the biggest capital cities across Europe?
Apart from answering these questions, the authors also talk about racism in football, and why minority groups or women haven't had great opportunities to manage clubs. They delve into game theory and the chapter on penalty kicks is fascinating.
Overall, I loved the book and would've given it 5 stars if the narrator in the audio version hadn't decided to do cheap impressions of various foreign accents when reading quotes from non-native English speakers.
Nevertheless, if you are a football fan with even a remote interest in data, don't miss this book!
Why don't England win more often? Who are the best fans? What is the best business model in club football? What is the link between medical facilities in a nation and its on-field success? Why aren't there more Champions League winners from the biggest capital cities across Europe?
Apart from answering these questions, the authors also talk about racism in football, and why minority groups or women haven't had great opportunities to manage clubs. They delve into game theory and the chapter on penalty kicks is fascinating.
Overall, I loved the book and would've given it 5 stars if the narrator in the audio version hadn't decided to do cheap impressions of various foreign accents when reading quotes from non-native English speakers.
Nevertheless, if you are a football fan with even a remote interest in data, don't miss this book!
September 9, 2018
অর্থনীতিবিদের চোখে ফুটবলের জগত, কিংবা ফুটবলের অর্থনীতি।
দুর্দান্ত বিশ্লেষণাত্মক বই। প্লেয়ারদের দলবদলের পিছনে অর্থনীতি, ফুটবলারদের বেতনের সাথে ক্লাবের সাফল্যের সম্পর্ক, পেনাল্টিতে পরিসংখ্যান আর মনোবিজ্ঞান ব্যবহার, কোচদের পরিসংখ্যান, অর্থনীতি ব্যবহার করে দল পরিচালনা, কোন দেশের ফুটবলের মাঠে সাফল্যের সাথে সে দেশের জিডিপি আর জনসংখ্যার প্রভাব কতোটুকু, ইত্যাদি সব মজার মজার তথ্য আর সে তথ্যগুলোর সহজ বিশ্লেষণ আর বাখ্যা নিয়ে বইটা লেখা হয়েছে।
যারা স্টিভেন লেভিটের ফ্রেকোনোমিকস, বা ডঃ আকবর আলি খানের পরার্থপরতা অর্থনীতি পড়ে মুগ্ধ হয়েছেন, এবং ফুটবল ভালোবাসেন, ফুটবলের জগতকে আরো ভালো করে বুঝতে চান, তাদের জন্য বইটা অবশ্যই অবশ্যপাঠ্য। আমার রেটিং ১০ এ ৯।
দুর্দান্ত বিশ্লেষণাত্মক বই। প্লেয়ারদের দলবদলের পিছনে অর্থনীতি, ফুটবলারদের বেতনের সাথে ক্লাবের সাফল্যের সম্পর্ক, পেনাল্টিতে পরিসংখ্যান আর মনোবিজ্ঞান ব্যবহার, কোচদের পরিসংখ্যান, অর্থনীতি ব্যবহার করে দল পরিচালনা, কোন দেশের ফুটবলের মাঠে সাফল্যের সাথে সে দেশের জিডিপি আর জনসংখ্যার প্রভাব কতোটুকু, ইত্যাদি সব মজার মজার তথ্য আর সে তথ্যগুলোর সহজ বিশ্লেষণ আর বাখ্যা নিয়ে বইটা লেখা হয়েছে।
যারা স্টিভেন লেভিটের ফ্রেকোনোমিকস, বা ডঃ আকবর আলি খানের পরার্থপরতা অর্থনীতি পড়ে মুগ্ধ হয়েছেন, এবং ফুটবল ভালোবাসেন, ফুটবলের জগতকে আরো ভালো করে বুঝতে চান, তাদের জন্য বইটা অবশ্যই অবশ্যপাঠ্য। আমার রেটিং ১০ এ ৯।
June 25, 2023
good book on the cause and effects of soccer without going too much into the game itself, it explains the picture around it really well and takes opposing viewpoints to most fans while calling out fan biases and how they are not necessarily correct. Would recommend. chugged through this thanks to the flights last week where i was able to knock out about 70% of the book
February 8, 2023
If stripped apart this book would make several decent Athletic articles, however, as a book it falls short of the “Moneyball” heights it’s shooting for. Some of the statistical findings are a bit of a stretch when certain variables are altered to make points that align with the book. At the end of the day the findings of the book are just not that earth shattering. The soccer fan in me gives it a two, but since I like charts and spreadsheets I’ll give it a 3 (2.5 would be ideal).
April 21, 2021
I’m going to personally deliver this book to the twelve owners of the teams who decided to create the European Super League. Honestly just read the first 8 chapters(John Henry I’m looking at you)
December 21, 2022
Part I of the book which focused on clubs was novel and insightful, but parts II and III, which focused on the fans and the countries were disappointing. Kuper and Szymanski use country level data to try to answer big overarching questions about which country loves soccer the most or which national team is the biggest overachiever. These are interesting questions, but the simple regressions that the authors used to try to reach the answers were unconvincing. Attempting to use GDP and country population data to explain which national teams overachieve seems like a stretch, glossing over chunks of soccer culture and history.
For someone who loves soccer and economics, I was expecting more from this book, but ultimately, I was left disappointed.
For someone who loves soccer and economics, I was expecting more from this book, but ultimately, I was left disappointed.
August 26, 2018
آقا من از بچگی برام سوال به صورت جدی مطرح بود که مثلا یکی در حد عبید زاکانی یا حافظ، چه جوری تن می دن به اینکه دیوانی رو تقدیم کنن به یک شمشیر زن حاکم
سر این کتاب قشنگ دستم اومد جریان از چه قراره
ببین، من هیچی نیستم، و تمام تاثیر من بر سرنوشت این کتاب، همین چهارخط "ری-ویو" ایه که می نویسم
نه کاتب دارم، نه کتاب شوران می تونم راه بندازم، منتها، به همین قدر از عرض اندام، وقتی قراره ستاره بدم به پیش سینه ی کتاب بچسبونن، سلیقه ام رو دخیل می کنم
این کتاب مصداق بارز اینه که هر کتاب فوتبالی، با یه پاراگراف در مدح آرسن ونگر، به عالی ترین جایگاه می رسه
نه که بگم کتاب بدیه، ولی وقتی مقدمه ی کتاب شرح کرامات ونگره، دیگه کی حالا اهمیت می ده که هر فصل سه چهار صفحه فقط آمار مثلا از درآمد باشگاه های انگلیس از لیگ برتر تا لیگ دسته دو، یا گل زده و خورده ی کشورهای جهان پشت سر هم ردیف شده؟
بعضی ها هم دیدم، بهانه گیر هستن، میگن این کتاب رو آقای سایمون کوپر با هم دستی یک اقتصاددان نوشته که مثلا بخوان به ونگر تیکه هم بندازن، که هیچ رنگی نداره این حنا طبیعتا
منظور این که اگر قرن پنجم هجری ای بود و من دستم به جایی بند بود، حتما در حفظ و نشر این کتاب به جد کوشش می کردم، جوری که احتمال داشت حتی شما در قرن چهاردهم ازش سوالاتی در ادبیات کنکور جواب بدین
کتاب خوبیه، علی الخصوص برای من که تو عمرم یه اندازه ی انگشتان دست مردم یک محله ی کم جمعیت هم فوتبال بازی نکردم
و اغلب نقد غیر فنی فوتبال، شبیه "ایستر اگ" های فیلم های هالیوودی برای "نرد" های "مارول و دی سی" برام جذاب تره
در این کتاب آقای کوپر، یک سری پیش فرض ها در فوتبال رو به صورت آماری به چالش می کشه و تلاش می کنه تا از دیدگاه های کهنسال و "علی اصغری" در فوتبال جهان توهم زدایی بکنه
این کتاب رو هم از روی "آدیبل" گوش کردم، با اجرای روح افزای آقای "کالین مِیس" که عالی بود
سر این کتاب قشنگ دستم اومد جریان از چه قراره
ببین، من هیچی نیستم، و تمام تاثیر من بر سرنوشت این کتاب، همین چهارخط "ری-ویو" ایه که می نویسم
نه کاتب دارم، نه کتاب شوران می تونم راه بندازم، منتها، به همین قدر از عرض اندام، وقتی قراره ستاره بدم به پیش سینه ی کتاب بچسبونن، سلیقه ام رو دخیل می کنم
این کتاب مصداق بارز اینه که هر کتاب فوتبالی، با یه پاراگراف در مدح آرسن ونگر، به عالی ترین جایگاه می رسه
نه که بگم کتاب بدیه، ولی وقتی مقدمه ی کتاب شرح کرامات ونگره، دیگه کی حالا اهمیت می ده که هر فصل سه چهار صفحه فقط آمار مثلا از درآمد باشگاه های انگلیس از لیگ برتر تا لیگ دسته دو، یا گل زده و خورده ی کشورهای جهان پشت سر هم ردیف شده؟
بعضی ها هم دیدم، بهانه گیر هستن، میگن این کتاب رو آقای سایمون کوپر با هم دستی یک اقتصاددان نوشته که مثلا بخوان به ونگر تیکه هم بندازن، که هیچ رنگی نداره این حنا طبیعتا
منظور این که اگر قرن پنجم هجری ای بود و من دستم به جایی بند بود، حتما در حفظ و نشر این کتاب به جد کوشش می کردم، جوری که احتمال داشت حتی شما در قرن چهاردهم ازش سوالاتی در ادبیات کنکور جواب بدین
کتاب خوبیه، علی الخصوص برای من که تو عمرم یه اندازه ی انگشتان دست مردم یک محله ی کم جمعیت هم فوتبال بازی نکردم
و اغلب نقد غیر فنی فوتبال، شبیه "ایستر اگ" های فیلم های هالیوودی برای "نرد" های "مارول و دی سی" برام جذاب تره
در این کتاب آقای کوپر، یک سری پیش فرض ها در فوتبال رو به صورت آماری به چالش می کشه و تلاش می کنه تا از دیدگاه های کهنسال و "علی اصغری" در فوتبال جهان توهم زدایی بکنه
این کتاب رو هم از روی "آدیبل" گوش کردم، با اجرای روح افزای آقای "کالین مِیس" که عالی بود
March 25, 2022
3.5/5
Soccernomics is a hotchpotch of three of the things I like most: football (soccer), economics, and statistics. What I enjoyed the most about the book was its description of the nuances of the business of football, particularly systemic failures in the transfer market, the problem of appropriability, debt accumulation by clubs, corruption in the sport, financial fair play regulations, and the economics of hosting football tournaments. One recurrent occurrence in the day of a football fan is running into run into news of ungodly amounts of money, be it player transfers, player salaries, television rights, or the purchase and administration of football clubs. Soccernomics helps contextualise these figures such that they don't seem absurd as they look at first glance. With its proper research on the history and economics of football, a football fan can rationalise the most bizarre happenings in the game we love: the attempted introduction of the European Super League, why Russia and Qatar were selected to hold the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, why football clubs never go bust, and why football clubs mimic firms in a communist economy. Part I of the book was a resounding 5/5.
But as I read on, I encountered the authors' "hot takes" which I would mildly describe as absurd. For instance, in Chapter 8, the authors pose the question "Do Coaches Still Matter?", to which they answer in the negative, because "it's often players rather than the manager who shape team tactics." The naivety of this conclusion is demonstrated by the authors' fallibility to selection bias: they conveniently select a few managerial examples as purported evidence that teams' performance will always "regress to the mean", regardless of who the manager is. The authors further argue that a manager, like a politician, is chosen more for his suitability as a symbolic figurehead than for his perceived competence; he is more of a head of PR, than an executive. These "hot takes" fly in the face of what the authors argue later in the book, that western continental Europe is advanced in football because of the exchange of football ideas among managerial legends like Arrigo Sacchi, Johan Cruyff, and Pep Guardiola.
The books is also glaringly littered with instances of "torturing the data until it confesses"; for instance, the authors seemingly equate correlation with causation in arguing that player wages, as opposed to expenditure on transfers, determine a club's position in the league. Further, in arguing that a penalty kick does not have an effect on the chances of a team winning, the authors commit the pedantic mistake of failing to distinguish between independent and dependent events in as dynamic a game as football. Additionally, the authors equate attendance with fandom in seeking to draw a conclusion that most fans are "polygamists". My biggest disappointment with the book was that its appraisals proclaimed it to be the "Moneyball of Soccer", which raised my expectations that the book would provide groundbreaking insights on football analytics, as Billy Beane and Bill James have done in baseball. I anticipated that the book would make for a good recommendation for a non-football fan as Moneyball does for non-baseball fans. The book, as it turns out, is less of a Moneyball than it is a "Freakonomics"; it appreciably expounds on football nuances but caters to a small niche of the sport's fans.
For all its shortcomings, Soccernomics was a page-turner. Any literature on football always makes for a compelling read. I particularly found amusement in the authors' adulation of "positional play" as pioneered by Johan Cruyff and adopted by Pep Guardiola, as opposed to the "pace and power" style of play that is descriptive of international football's perennial failure, England.
A good read for any football romanticist.
Soccernomics is a hotchpotch of three of the things I like most: football (soccer), economics, and statistics. What I enjoyed the most about the book was its description of the nuances of the business of football, particularly systemic failures in the transfer market, the problem of appropriability, debt accumulation by clubs, corruption in the sport, financial fair play regulations, and the economics of hosting football tournaments. One recurrent occurrence in the day of a football fan is running into run into news of ungodly amounts of money, be it player transfers, player salaries, television rights, or the purchase and administration of football clubs. Soccernomics helps contextualise these figures such that they don't seem absurd as they look at first glance. With its proper research on the history and economics of football, a football fan can rationalise the most bizarre happenings in the game we love: the attempted introduction of the European Super League, why Russia and Qatar were selected to hold the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, why football clubs never go bust, and why football clubs mimic firms in a communist economy. Part I of the book was a resounding 5/5.
But as I read on, I encountered the authors' "hot takes" which I would mildly describe as absurd. For instance, in Chapter 8, the authors pose the question "Do Coaches Still Matter?", to which they answer in the negative, because "it's often players rather than the manager who shape team tactics." The naivety of this conclusion is demonstrated by the authors' fallibility to selection bias: they conveniently select a few managerial examples as purported evidence that teams' performance will always "regress to the mean", regardless of who the manager is. The authors further argue that a manager, like a politician, is chosen more for his suitability as a symbolic figurehead than for his perceived competence; he is more of a head of PR, than an executive. These "hot takes" fly in the face of what the authors argue later in the book, that western continental Europe is advanced in football because of the exchange of football ideas among managerial legends like Arrigo Sacchi, Johan Cruyff, and Pep Guardiola.
The books is also glaringly littered with instances of "torturing the data until it confesses"; for instance, the authors seemingly equate correlation with causation in arguing that player wages, as opposed to expenditure on transfers, determine a club's position in the league. Further, in arguing that a penalty kick does not have an effect on the chances of a team winning, the authors commit the pedantic mistake of failing to distinguish between independent and dependent events in as dynamic a game as football. Additionally, the authors equate attendance with fandom in seeking to draw a conclusion that most fans are "polygamists". My biggest disappointment with the book was that its appraisals proclaimed it to be the "Moneyball of Soccer", which raised my expectations that the book would provide groundbreaking insights on football analytics, as Billy Beane and Bill James have done in baseball. I anticipated that the book would make for a good recommendation for a non-football fan as Moneyball does for non-baseball fans. The book, as it turns out, is less of a Moneyball than it is a "Freakonomics"; it appreciably expounds on football nuances but caters to a small niche of the sport's fans.
For all its shortcomings, Soccernomics was a page-turner. Any literature on football always makes for a compelling read. I particularly found amusement in the authors' adulation of "positional play" as pioneered by Johan Cruyff and adopted by Pep Guardiola, as opposed to the "pace and power" style of play that is descriptive of international football's perennial failure, England.
A good read for any football romanticist.
December 23, 2022
On the eve of what many professionals in the sport consider to be the most exciting World Cup final ever, starring France and Argentina in Qatar '22, Kylian Mbappe, France's goal-scoring megastar said in an interview with the press that he thought that European football was superior to South American football and that such superiority gave his team an edge in the final. "All of the recent World Cup Champions have been European", he added.
Many, especially in the Latin American press, took exception to this declaration citing how 9 out of the 21 world cups to date had been won by Latin-American teams (Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay). Rage ensued.
And so began the Battle of Lusail Stadium, in which Argentina prevailed in what was perhaps the longest, most heart-stopping game I have ever witnessed. Yes, I am Argentinian. And thus, Kylian Mbappe was proven wrong. Or was he?
Kuper and Szymanski would beg to differ, and they have the data to back it up; Western European football has many things going for it that put it a step above every other region, so there is substance to Mbappe's argument.
In finding out the answer to the question above, I came to appreciate the work and intellectual diligence of the authors in crafting such an intelligent, analytical, data-driven tour of the more contentious aspects of world football. They left no stone unturned.
I had read mixed reviews of the earlier versions of this one, so I put off reading it for a long time. However, the major complaints seem to have been addressed and the authors edited the offending chapters to outline where they went wrong, and duly updated their viewpoints and predictions. This is the version you want to read!
For instance, they had predicted that Australia, Turkey, and Iraq would become "kings of the sport", however, the new edition explains how their insights have changed and why they believe this is no longer the case.
They also explain why American women have been so dominant whereas the men have not, why football, in general, is bad business, why it is almost impossible to kill off a club, and why the figure of the monogamist football fan forever devoted to his one and only childhood team, is outdated and plain wrong.
They end their work by creating a model that helps explain the long-term success of the biggest teams (and their failures), and that assists in creating a ranking for the most overachieving teams in the world, and the worst underachievers as well.
It is a riot of a read if you love football. A must-read for fans of the sport. Highest possible recommendation!
Many, especially in the Latin American press, took exception to this declaration citing how 9 out of the 21 world cups to date had been won by Latin-American teams (Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay). Rage ensued.
And so began the Battle of Lusail Stadium, in which Argentina prevailed in what was perhaps the longest, most heart-stopping game I have ever witnessed. Yes, I am Argentinian. And thus, Kylian Mbappe was proven wrong. Or was he?
Kuper and Szymanski would beg to differ, and they have the data to back it up; Western European football has many things going for it that put it a step above every other region, so there is substance to Mbappe's argument.
In finding out the answer to the question above, I came to appreciate the work and intellectual diligence of the authors in crafting such an intelligent, analytical, data-driven tour of the more contentious aspects of world football. They left no stone unturned.
I had read mixed reviews of the earlier versions of this one, so I put off reading it for a long time. However, the major complaints seem to have been addressed and the authors edited the offending chapters to outline where they went wrong, and duly updated their viewpoints and predictions. This is the version you want to read!
For instance, they had predicted that Australia, Turkey, and Iraq would become "kings of the sport", however, the new edition explains how their insights have changed and why they believe this is no longer the case.
They also explain why American women have been so dominant whereas the men have not, why football, in general, is bad business, why it is almost impossible to kill off a club, and why the figure of the monogamist football fan forever devoted to his one and only childhood team, is outdated and plain wrong.
They end their work by creating a model that helps explain the long-term success of the biggest teams (and their failures), and that assists in creating a ranking for the most overachieving teams in the world, and the worst underachievers as well.
It is a riot of a read if you love football. A must-read for fans of the sport. Highest possible recommendation!
Read
June 9, 2018In preparation for the World Cup. This book was published in 2012 and is a bit dated but still full of knowledge and theories about soccer. The pair are reporter and economist and naturally they use a lot of numbers and formulae to make their points. I'm not sold on all of these numbers in particular the significance of population size on a country's success at the sport. Nonetheless they write with wit and wisdom on many things including; the unreliability of the transfer market, the significance of coaching, the nature of fandom and most especially I think on why England has not been more successful. Their forecasts for which countries will dominate soccer in the future have not yet panned out but we will be keeping an eye out. A treasure trove for any soccer nut.
August 4, 2018
Overall good, very informative good encyclopedia for football fans. The chapter on suicides and football was a little too much.
Nobody likes Trump, but I don't think it is necessary to tell that in the book about football when he doesn't fit into context at all.
This review is about the World Cup edition.
Nobody likes Trump, but I don't think it is necessary to tell that in the book about football when he doesn't fit into context at all.
This review is about the World Cup edition.
April 29, 2022
The science and business of soccer worldwide with a large focus on European clubs. I grabbed this recent Audible sale since my boys are little soccer babies. I’m not super familiar with professional soccer, but this was an interesting study gauging why teams win or lose, and various other scenarios. It’s not as simple as it sounds. Details such as a country’s GDP, population; penalty kicks, especially shootouts, and so on. A niche read.
July 16, 2022
Was quite an interesting read especially if, like me, you’re a nerd that likes football. Full of interesting theories backed with statistical evidence.
Not technical-jargon heavy and quite dumbed down so it’s very easy to read (which makes sense because it’s aimed at football fans probably lmao). Enjoy!
Not technical-jargon heavy and quite dumbed down so it’s very easy to read (which makes sense because it’s aimed at football fans probably lmao). Enjoy!
November 23, 2022
The best non fiction I read this year.
Their ability to merge the math and colorful prespectives was so good.
Each episode is fantastic and quite stuffed with raw data and superlative arguments.
Their ability to merge the math and colorful prespectives was so good.
Each episode is fantastic and quite stuffed with raw data and superlative arguments.
January 24, 2021
Couldn’t put it down. Lots to learn about soccer, culture and adapting to change.
August 7, 2015
Being precisely one of the people who tends to scoff at the supposedly American use of the word 'soccer', preferring and even insisting on 'football', there's a chastening moment in this tome when the writers, who have been using the word enough by that stage to really be sticking in my craw, point out that in fact the decline in the use of the word essentially dates to the late 1970s, when the NASL was formed. That it's essentially a form of cultural snobbery: you use it, then we won't. Which I'm not really down with practicing, whenever I can possibly help it. So okay, point taken. Soccer it shall be.
This book is a cross between the Freakonomics vibe of quantifying oddball trivia (and a few central zeitgeist questions), the Moneyball vibe of putting numbers where sporting received wisdom sits, and the typical pub genius getting on his high horse after the fourth pint - "I'll prove to you just why this is shit and that is not, with numbers" - so that you shall evermore be chastened and under his (pseudo)-intellectual thumb. That perhaps sounds a little forbidding, the truth is it's good to see a little mathematics stepping into redeem some beliefs and puncture others. A few central myths are debunked: Maradona's 1980s Argentina performed worse in terms of wins than any other moment in the country's history (but won some big prizes, sometimes with divine assistance), England is an overachiever not an underachiever, and is expected to have to wait a long time to win anything big, and a World Cups are never money-spinners for their hosts.
Well, the last one is obvious to anyone with two eyes, notions of arithmetic and no vested interest. The first is indeed surprising, although it has to be said that it won't be pacifying any of the ridiculous Messi-sceptics currently parading their inability to understand how teams work when there are 11 men on a field. And the second point is also sadly true, that England is quicker with the self-serving excuse and scapegoat than the new dawn that could come about with someone changing the approach, the way, say, Clive Woodward did with the England rugby team in the late 1990s up until the World Cup win of 2003. The difference was not that they started winning, but the way they won, rampaging backs and back rowers and incisive creative use of the ball, not hitherto a hallmark of England teams. They found new strengths to play to and made their Southern Hemisphere opponents afraid for the first time ever.
With the numbers in hand, Kuper and Szymanski look to show up all the clichés: Spain was in fact the No. 1 team before they won the European championship in 2008, rather than an underachiever, and the real team to watch is Iraq… We'll see how that one plays out. Occasionally they trip over themselves. Where Europe's networking is supposedly it's real strength, and will soon be it's Achilles heel, England's failure is its lack of ability to let in outsiders (to coaching) or to travel and learn, and the clubs Ajax and Barcelona are successful precisely because they don't travel but stay at the same club, lovingly nurturing their young charges… Sounds a bit like sauce for the goose. What is definitely true is that until England gets some self-criticism it is unlikely to win, and while the Masia at FC Barcelona works hand-in-glove with the first team it is likely to have a better conversion rate than most clubs.
We also get a look at Guus Hiddink, a modern-day missionary, the current state of the soccer fan and a musing on the relationship between suicide and football/soccer. In the same way that you stumble out of the pub with the conviction that the pub genius has just identified what weakness will bring down such and such a club (mark my words), you find yourself over the next few days looking out for the truth that may have lain in his words. So you do with this book. These two, well-informed and cosmopolitan as it gets in football terms, have set out a series of statistical proofs that we will now get a whole series of real life experiments to test out. Bring it on.
This book is a cross between the Freakonomics vibe of quantifying oddball trivia (and a few central zeitgeist questions), the Moneyball vibe of putting numbers where sporting received wisdom sits, and the typical pub genius getting on his high horse after the fourth pint - "I'll prove to you just why this is shit and that is not, with numbers" - so that you shall evermore be chastened and under his (pseudo)-intellectual thumb. That perhaps sounds a little forbidding, the truth is it's good to see a little mathematics stepping into redeem some beliefs and puncture others. A few central myths are debunked: Maradona's 1980s Argentina performed worse in terms of wins than any other moment in the country's history (but won some big prizes, sometimes with divine assistance), England is an overachiever not an underachiever, and is expected to have to wait a long time to win anything big, and a World Cups are never money-spinners for their hosts.
Well, the last one is obvious to anyone with two eyes, notions of arithmetic and no vested interest. The first is indeed surprising, although it has to be said that it won't be pacifying any of the ridiculous Messi-sceptics currently parading their inability to understand how teams work when there are 11 men on a field. And the second point is also sadly true, that England is quicker with the self-serving excuse and scapegoat than the new dawn that could come about with someone changing the approach, the way, say, Clive Woodward did with the England rugby team in the late 1990s up until the World Cup win of 2003. The difference was not that they started winning, but the way they won, rampaging backs and back rowers and incisive creative use of the ball, not hitherto a hallmark of England teams. They found new strengths to play to and made their Southern Hemisphere opponents afraid for the first time ever.
With the numbers in hand, Kuper and Szymanski look to show up all the clichés: Spain was in fact the No. 1 team before they won the European championship in 2008, rather than an underachiever, and the real team to watch is Iraq… We'll see how that one plays out. Occasionally they trip over themselves. Where Europe's networking is supposedly it's real strength, and will soon be it's Achilles heel, England's failure is its lack of ability to let in outsiders (to coaching) or to travel and learn, and the clubs Ajax and Barcelona are successful precisely because they don't travel but stay at the same club, lovingly nurturing their young charges… Sounds a bit like sauce for the goose. What is definitely true is that until England gets some self-criticism it is unlikely to win, and while the Masia at FC Barcelona works hand-in-glove with the first team it is likely to have a better conversion rate than most clubs.
We also get a look at Guus Hiddink, a modern-day missionary, the current state of the soccer fan and a musing on the relationship between suicide and football/soccer. In the same way that you stumble out of the pub with the conviction that the pub genius has just identified what weakness will bring down such and such a club (mark my words), you find yourself over the next few days looking out for the truth that may have lain in his words. So you do with this book. These two, well-informed and cosmopolitan as it gets in football terms, have set out a series of statistical proofs that we will now get a whole series of real life experiments to test out. Bring it on.
August 20, 2009
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 world, been instrumental in bringing about global crisis, and carried it all out with a smug, “we know best because we are rational thinkers” grin, was a prospect that held little appeal. A recent book by Ben Fine and Dimitris Milonakis effectively debunked the Freakonomics myth and even the mainstream of the discipline has now largely moved on.
I thus read the text with an eagle eye to see if Szymanski remains beholden to the now discredited theories of straightforward neoclassical economics. Without question, he likes playing around with numbers. There is little econometrics in the text and mathematical content is kept to a minimum, but it’s very clear that statistics provide the foundation on which the central theses are built. Refreshingly, however, the limitations of standard economics are tacitly admitted and new currents of thinking abound. That hottest of new fields, behavioural economics is omnipresent, with issues such as fairness and reciprocity freely debated. Equally, the institutional context is in the foreground: habits, norms, values and cultural factors are all given their space in the book’s models. In addition, and all too rarely in these times, history isn’t ignored either: football has only been properly organised for a century and a half and the coverage of Why England Lose covers the whole period. Towards the end, notions of happiness are explored in the context of staging major events such as Olympics and World Cups, a much talked about benchmark of society’s wellbeing popularized by economists such as Andrew Oswald and Richard Layard.
So Szymanski is steeped in modern economics and has moved adroitly with the times. What of the football?
It’s actually pretty good. The dual author team display much knowledge and keen research and their claims are generally very plausible, even if the criteria and framing of their models is necessarily limited on occasion. As a fervent lower league supporter, I didn’t much enjoy the discussion of fair weather fans, but we all know that Kuper and Szymanski are right to point out how widespread they are. The prediction of which nations are likely to be world football powers soon - Turkey, China, Australia etc. – was fascinating, and the 12 Point plan the authors devise to avoid mistakes in the transfer market is superbly argued.
The only major problem with the book is the highly misleading title. The book isn’t very much about England at all and the news that Peter Crouch’s Dad is the Creative Director of an International Advertising Agency apart, provides little in the way of interest concerning the Three Lions. “Soccernomics”, albeit clichéd and too resonant of Steve Shmankse’s Golfonomics, would have been a choice more appropriate to the book’s content. Nevertheless, overall, Kuper and Szymanski provide much to chew on for football folk and the general public alike. It’s just a shame that the title may prevent the latter from picking the book up.
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 world, been instrumental in bringing about global crisis, and carried it all out with a smug, “we know best because we are rational thinkers” grin, was a prospect that held little appeal. A recent book by Ben Fine and Dimitris Milonakis effectively debunked the Freakonomics myth and even the mainstream of the discipline has now largely moved on.
I thus read the text with an eagle eye to see if Szymanski remains beholden to the now discredited theories of straightforward neoclassical economics. Without question, he likes playing around with numbers. There is little econometrics in the text and mathematical content is kept to a minimum, but it’s very clear that statistics provide the foundation on which the central theses are built. Refreshingly, however, the limitations of standard economics are tacitly admitted and new currents of thinking abound. That hottest of new fields, behavioural economics is omnipresent, with issues such as fairness and reciprocity freely debated. Equally, the institutional context is in the foreground: habits, norms, values and cultural factors are all given their space in the book’s models. In addition, and all too rarely in these times, history isn’t ignored either: football has only been properly organised for a century and a half and the coverage of Why England Lose covers the whole period. Towards the end, notions of happiness are explored in the context of staging major events such as Olympics and World Cups, a much talked about benchmark of society’s wellbeing popularized by economists such as Andrew Oswald and Richard Layard.
So Szymanski is steeped in modern economics and has moved adroitly with the times. What of the football?
It’s actually pretty good. The dual author team display much knowledge and keen research and their claims are generally very plausible, even if the criteria and framing of their models is necessarily limited on occasion. As a fervent lower league supporter, I didn’t much enjoy the discussion of fair weather fans, but we all know that Kuper and Szymanski are right to point out how widespread they are. The prediction of which nations are likely to be world football powers soon - Turkey, China, Australia etc. – was fascinating, and the 12 Point plan the authors devise to avoid mistakes in the transfer market is superbly argued.
The only major problem with the book is the highly misleading title. The book isn’t very much about England at all and the news that Peter Crouch’s Dad is the Creative Director of an International Advertising Agency apart, provides little in the way of interest concerning the Three Lions. “Soccernomics”, albeit clichéd and too resonant of Steve Shmankse’s Golfonomics, would have been a choice more appropriate to the book’s content. Nevertheless, overall, Kuper and Szymanski provide much to chew on for football folk and the general public alike. It’s just a shame that the title may prevent the latter from picking the book up.
September 5, 2021
The Moneyball of the greatest sport in the world, this book describes football’s own data revolution, and its contributions to making football an even more globalised phenomenon. Benefitting from over a century’s worth of evidence, Soccernomics explains how data is used to commandeer teams’ transfer strategies, whether a left or right footer should take a left corner, and why Malaysia will never win the World Cup, among other things.
What I liked:
Actual, reliable data, numberless interviews with the relevant people, and the lethal partnership of a journalist and an economist combine to bring you a very much readable account of football from a numbers perspective. There’s also a bunch of inside stories (Edwin Van der Sar’s brilliantly executed mind games in Moscow ‘08) that sheds new light on some of the biggest moments in the sport’s history. I also really like football.
What I disliked:
Pretty much nothing. Best book I’ve read all year.
What I liked:
Actual, reliable data, numberless interviews with the relevant people, and the lethal partnership of a journalist and an economist combine to bring you a very much readable account of football from a numbers perspective. There’s also a bunch of inside stories (Edwin Van der Sar’s brilliantly executed mind games in Moscow ‘08) that sheds new light on some of the biggest moments in the sport’s history. I also really like football.
What I disliked:
Pretty much nothing. Best book I’ve read all year.
August 26, 2017
It is nice in some parts where the authors leave statistics aside, like when they quoted somebody else or didn't talk in just numbers. it was very nice explaining the Hiddink experience, south african football, whether club boards really care or not about silverware, working class values between English footballers and so. But it was really boring and a bit naive when it used regression and other techniques with some factors to check whether a certain country is overachieving or underperforming in football. I also hated the way they over-estimated the value of the premier league! On financial terms they were right, but the quality of football there is not the best at all. I also hated the every now and then reference to a baseball experience that is being repeated with football, and finally I really hated the use of the term "soccer" instead of "football".
October 19, 2022
The first 30% - 40% of this book was fantastic; It addressed really engaging topics like how to take advantage of inefficiencies in the transfer market to gain a competitive advantage, corruption in soccer's governing bodies. The middle of book was good. The only bad thing I can say about it is that a few of the book's conclusions were reached by evidence which was largely anecdotal and the topics of a couple of the middle chapters seemed disconnected from both the book's thesis and why most people picked up the book in the first place; topics like fan suicide rates and soccer's effect on the happiness of a population - not bad things to talk about, just kind of boring. The last 10% - 20% went back to being really engaging.
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