Member's News
No.47
May 2006
 
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Observatory of the European Football Players' Labor Market
Raffaele Poli

 

Professional football generates increasing mobility worldwide. The explosion of the number of players migrating through football makes an intuitive approach to the phenomenon extremely difficult.
From a territorial perspective, the goal of the observatory is to measure different correlations between footballers’ flows and the characteristics of the clubs, cities, regions and countries that are the theatre of this circulation.
From a sport perspective, the project aims to collect the available information on footballers’ transfers in order to allow an overall vision of the phenomenon and to furnish valuable data to football directing instances, both at the national and international level.

Approach and results
The approach proposed aims to create an Observatory based on a longitudinal data bank containing different types of information on players, clubs, town, regions and countries.
Correlations between these data will be tested automatically using a tool called conceptual model of data (MCD) associating statistics and cartographic software.
The MCD permits an analysis of selected information by means of several reading levels:
  • A simple reading of each of the variables illustrating a particular phenomenon for a given year (example: the European cities possessing a club playing at the highest national competition level).
  • A cartographic and graphical reading allowing a new legibility of observed phenomena (example: the spatial distribution of non communitarian players in Europe).
  • A cross reading of information that would not be apparent at first glance (example: the proportion of home grown players in clubs).
  • A longitudinal reading that makes it possible to follow the evolution of a phenomenon through the creation of stable and comparable indicators (example: the changes in the players' flows in relation to the changes in the legislation regarding the free movement of workers).
Area of study
Previously, it had seemed judicious to proceed step by step by integrating data from specialized press on players taking part in the highest national competition level in the five most important European championships (England, Italy, Spain, Germany, France), as well as on the clubs and cities of these countries.
Results in the long term
In the longer term, the project could be further developed through the integration of data on European countries and continents where football is also organized in a professional way such as Asia and Latin America. From the outset, the MCD will be programmed in order to allow for these possible future developments.


Contact:
Raffaele Poli
International Center for Sport Studies (CIES)
C/o Hotel DuPeyrou
Avenue DuPeyrou 1
2000 Neuchatel
Switzerland
raffaele.poli@unine.ch





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