Analysis and Evolution of Efficiency in the Spanish Soccer League (2000/01 - 2007/08)

Abstract

This paper aims to analyse the efficiency of the teams that have participated in the last eight seasons in the Spanish football (soccer) league (LFP). Efficiency is based on technical aspects of the sport rather than variables of an economic nature due to how difficult it is to obtain such information from the clubs that make up the Spanish league. These measures are obtained for attack and defense, as both are essentials parts of football as a sport. To measure the efficiency we used a DEA model. Once the two facets mentioned above are defined, it is important to find out whether they are more directly related to the achievement of the points at stake in each match, as the final goal is to gain as many points as possible in order to win the competition or even to avoid are being relegated to the second division. Finally, we measure how the eight teams that have played in the first division for the last few seasons have performed. These teams are primarily the ones that have finished those seasons up the table. In order to achieve this, a DEA-Window analysis is carried out with two windows, as this makes it possible to compare two consecutive seasons. Most teams change either players or their manager from one season to another, which means there is little sense football-wise to analyse windows of more than three seasons.