IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zrh/wpaper/382.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The advantage of scoring just before the halftime break – pure myth? Quasi-experimental evidence from European football

Author

Listed:
  • Philippe Meier

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

  • Maximilian Rüdisser

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

  • Raphael Flepp

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

  • Egon Franck

    (Department of Business Administration, University of Zurich)

Abstract

We examine whether the moment just before the halftime break is a particularly good time to score a goal. Using detailed data from the top five European football leagues between the 2013/14 and 2017/18 seasons, we exploit the quasi-random occurrence of goals scored just before and just after the halftime break. In the former situation, the game is exogenously inter-rupted by a break immediately after the goal, whereas in the latter situation, the game continues without interruption. We show that in the case of a goal being scored just before halftime, the scoring team benefits more from the halftime break than the conceding team.

Suggested Citation

  • Philippe Meier & Maximilian Rüdisser & Raphael Flepp & Egon Franck, 2019. "The advantage of scoring just before the halftime break – pure myth? Quasi-experimental evidence from European football," Working Papers 382, University of Zurich, Department of Business Administration (IBW).
    • Handle: RePEc:zrh:wpaper:382
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.business.uzh.ch/RePEc/zrh/wpaper/382_IBW_full.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Björn Bartling & Leif Brandes & Daniel Schunk, 2015. "Expectations as Reference Points: Field Evidence from Professional Soccer," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(11), pages 2646-2661, November.
    2. Dohmen, Thomas J., 2008. "Do professionals choke under pressure?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 65(3-4), pages 636-653, March.
    3. Raphael Flepp & Egon Franck, 2019. "The role of boards' misperceptions in the relation between managerial turnover and performance: Evidence from European football," Working Papers 380, University of Zurich, Department of Business Administration (IBW).
    4. Karen Croxson & J. James Reade, 2014. "Information and Efficiency: Goal Arrival in Soccer Betting," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(575), pages 62-91, March.
    5. Marc Brechot & Raphael Flepp, 2018. "Dealing with randomness in match outcomes: how to rethink performance evaluation and decision-making in European club football," Working Papers 374, University of Zurich, Department of Business Administration (IBW).
    6. Stijn Baert & Simon Amez, 2018. "No better moment to score a goal than just before half time? A soccer myth statistically tested," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(3), pages 1-17, March.
    7. Gauriot, Romain & Page, Lionel, 2018. "Psychological momentum in contests: The case of scoring before half-time in football," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 137-168.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Marius Ötting & Christian Deutscher & Carl Singleton & Luca De Angelis, 2023. "Gambling on Momentum in Contests," Economics Discussion Papers em-dp2023-08, Department of Economics, University of Reading.
    2. Philippe Meier & Raphael Flepp & Maximilian Ruedisser & Egon Franck, 2020. "The Advantage of Scoring Just Before the Half-Time Break—Pure Myth? Quasi-Experimental Evidence From European Football," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 21(5), pages 548-565, June.
    3. Bar-Eli, Michael & Krumer, Alex & Morgulev, Elia, 2020. "Ask not what economics can do for sports - Ask what sports can do for economics," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    4. David Boto-Garcìa & Alessandro Bucciol & Luca Zarri, 2020. "Managerial Beliefs and Firm Performance: Field Evidence from Professional Elite Soccer," Working Papers 19/2020, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    5. Morgulev, Elia & Azar, Ofer H. & Bar-Eli, Michael, 2019. "Does a “comeback” create momentum in overtime? Analysis of NBA tied games," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 75(PB).
    6. Masaya Nishihata & Suguru Otani, 2024. "Reference Points, Risk-Taking Behavior, and Competitive Outcomes in Sequential Settings," Papers 2409.13333, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2025.
    7. Lackner, Mario & Sonnabend, Hendrik, 2021. "Coping with advantageous inequity—Field evidence from professional penalty kicking," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    8. Raphael Flepp & Oliver Merz & Egon Franck, 2024. "When the league table lies: Does outcome bias lead to informationally inefficient markets?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 62(1), pages 414-429, January.
    9. Barge-Gil, Andrés & García-Hiernaux, Alfredo, 2019. "Staking plans in sports betting under unknown true probabilities of the event," MPRA Paper 92196, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Spilker Finn & Ötting Marius, 2024. "No cheering in the background? Individual performance in professional darts during COVID-19," Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, De Gruyter, vol. 20(3), pages 219-234.
    11. Michael T. Rauh & Giulio Seccia, 2010. "Agency and Anxiety," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 19(1), pages 87-116, March.
      • Michael T. Rauh & Giulio Seccia, 2006. "Agency and Anxiety," Working Papers 2006-02, Indiana University, Kelley School of Business, Department of Business Economics and Public Policy.
    12. Böheim, René & Lackner, Mario, 2013. "Gender and Competition: Evidence from Jumping Competitions," IZA Discussion Papers 7243, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Reto Foellmi & Stefan Legge & Lukas Schmid, 2016. "Do Professionals Get It Right? Limited Attention and Risk‐taking Behaviour," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0(592), pages 724-755, May.
    14. Klein Teeselink, Bouke & Potter van Loon, Rogier J.D. & van den Assem, Martijn J. & van Dolder, Dennie, 2020. "Incentives, performance and choking in darts," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 38-52.
    15. Mark Richard & Jan Vecer, 2021. "Efficiency Testing of Prediction Markets: Martingale Approach, Likelihood Ratio and Bayes Factor Analysis," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-20, February.
    16. Daniel Goller, 2023. "Analysing a built-in advantage in asymmetric darts contests using causal machine learning," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 325(1), pages 649-679, June.
    17. Kai Fischer & Justus Haucap, 2022. "Home advantage in professional soccer and betting market efficiency: The role of spectator crowds," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(2), pages 294-316, May.
    18. Fernando Manuel Otero-Saborido & Rubén D. Aguado-Méndez & Víctor M. Torreblanca-Martínez & José Antonio González-Jurado, 2021. "Technical-Tactical Performance from Data Providers: A Systematic Review in Regular Football Leagues," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(18), pages 1-15, September.
    19. Luigi Buzzacchi & Stefano Pedrini, 2014. "Does player specialization predict player actions? Evidence from penalty kicks at FIFA World Cup and UEFA Euro Cup," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(10), pages 1067-1080, April.
    20. Angelini, Giovanni & De Angelis, Luca & Singleton, Carl, 2022. "Informational efficiency and behaviour within in-play prediction markets," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 282-299.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • L83 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Sports; Gambling; Restaurants; Recreation; Tourism
    • Z20 - Other Special Topics - - Sports Economics - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zrh:wpaper:382. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Daniela Koller (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ibuzhch.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.