No Better Moment to Score a Goal than Just Before Half Time? A Soccer Myth Statistically Tested

Stijn Baert and Simon Amez

No 9980, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We test the soccer myth suggesting that a particularly good moment to score a goal is just before half time. To this end, rich data on 1,179 games played in the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League are analysed. In contrast to the myth, we find that, conditional on the goal difference and other game characteristics at half time, the final goal difference at the advantage of the home team is 0.520 goals lower in case of a goal just before half time by this team. We show that this finding relates to this team's lower probability of scoring a goal during the second half.

Keywords: fixed effects regression models; soccer; sports; goal scoring (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J44 L83 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2016-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-spo
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Published - revised version published in: Plos One , 2018, 13 (3), e0194255

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Journal Article: No better moment to score a goal than just before half time? A soccer myth statistically tested (2018)
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