Competitive balance and demand for European men's football: a review of the literature

Research question: In European men’s club football, competitive balance is decreasing. Review articles have concluded that the empirical studies do not provide a unanimous answer to the question whether this decrease leads to lower utility for the fans. This paper investigates whether the conclusion of the reviews is (still) correct.

Research methods: Qualitative analysis is applied to get a better interpretation of the results of the empirical studies.

Results and findings: There are three types of uncertainty of outcome: short-term, seasonal, and long-term, with possible different dimensions within one type. A possible interpretation of the literature is the following: a decrease in one or two types of uncertainty of outcome, or a certain dimension, can lead to serious reductions in welfare, while the conclusion may be different for other types or dimensions. Several studies suggest that a decrease in (a certain type of) competitive balance has no effect on welfare, or just a small effect, if the competitive balance remains above some minimum level whereas once the competitive balance is below this level, further decreases in it result in serious welfare reductions. Taking these and other points into account, the review concludes that it is highly plausible that the present level of competitive balance is below the welfare-maximising level in most competitions at least, and any further decrease in it will seriously reduce welfare.

Implications: Policies that improve competitive balance will plausibly also improve welfare.

Research contribution: Compared to other review studies, this paper pays more attention to the reasons why different empirical studies get different results, which enables a less ambiguous conclusion.