In 1964, Neale suggested, in addition to competitive balance, a league standing effect that was never tested per se with empirical data. A model that explains fan attendance in the French football Ligue 1 over 2008-2011 is presented. It takes on-board point difference with the closest competitor chasing a different sporting stake, and positive and negative changes regarding the different sporting stakes. Econometric testing exhibits a negative impact of point difference (i.e., a positive impact of the possibilities of changes), a positive impact of positive changes, and no significant impact of negative changes.

<!--BeginNoIndex--> Résumé <!--EndNoIndex--> <!--BeginNoIndex--> Français <!--EndNoIndex--> Le modèle américain d’équilibre compétitif des ligues de sport d’équipes professionnel est inapte à analyser les ligues européennes de football. Il oppose l’équilibre walrasien à l’équilibre compétitif quand les clubs maximisent le profit et remet en cause les régulations existantes. Son test empirique donne des résultats mitigés. Il est dépassé par des modèles où les clubs sportifs maximisent les victoires sous contrainte budgétaire et où l’offre de travail des joueurs est flexible, en jeu non coopératif. L’article ouvre trois pistes de recherche : introduire l’enjeu sportif dans ces modèles ; élaborer un modèle de déséquilibre où les clubs sont soumis à une contrainte budgétaire « molle » liée à leur faible gouvernance ; il teste un cercle vicieux entre revenus tirés de la tv et salaires du football français. <!--BeginNoIndex--> English <!--EndNoIndex--> American modelling of competitive balance in professional team sports leagues is unsuited to analyse European football. It objects pro-competitive balance regulation as being non Walrasian when teams are profit maximising. Testing the model comes out with mitigated results. Such approach has recently been outdated by models with win maximising clubs under a budget constraint and a flexible supply of talent in a non cooperative game. This article ploughs into three research paths suggesting the introduction of a sport contention variable; advocating for a disequilibrium model where clubs would have a “soft” budget constraint rooted in their weak governance; and it empirically tests a vicious circle between tv rights revenues and wages in French football. Classification JEL : L83, L21, J42, J31, G30.

Despite the globalisation of European soccer, each professional league exhibits specificities. French Ligue 1 sometimes contends with the trading-off of financial performance against sporting performance of its teams in European soccer competitions, and its inner auditing body, the Direction Nationale du Contrôle de Gestion (DNCG), is in charge of controlling clubs’ financial accounts. Moreover, Ligue 1 operates with one of the best competitive balances in the Big Five, which is detrimental to its clubs’ success at the European level. However, the league and a number of clubs have not been able to curb payroll inflation and have not avoided being recurrently run in a deficit and accumulating debts, in particular payment arrears and player transfer overdue. Lax management occurs, since very few clubs have been sanctioned by a payment failure, even fewer by liquidation, and there has been no bankruptcy. The concept of a soft budget constraint theoretically encapsulates such empirical evidence. The novelty of the paper is to establish a link between the soft budget constraint and the players’ labour market where it crucially triggers market disequilibria: an excess of demand for superstars’ talents and an excess of supply for journeymen players are modelled. Data paucity about player individual wages hinders econometric testing of the aforementioned link and the model. However, a look at transfer fees that concentrates on a few of the top European soccer clubs provides a first insight into the arms race for talent that fuels an excess of demand for superstars and dips a number of clubs’ finance into the red.

On compare les choix institutionnels des sports professionnels en Amérique du Nord (ligue fermée) et en Europe (ligue ouverte). Une importante régulation (‘quasi-socialiste’) des ligues américaines contraste avec la dérégulation croissante des sports professionnels européens. L’explosion des droits de télévision y entraîne une concentration financière sur quelques clubs riches, ce qui nuit à l’équilibre sportif des championnats nationaux et appelle davantage de régulation.

Le modèle économique du football européen se caractérise par de forts déséquilibres compétitifs dans les différentes compétitions européennes (Ligue des champions, Europa League ) et entre les équipes nationales. Ces déséquilibres sont liés à d’importantes disparités de revenus entre les ligues nationales et les clubs, la concurrence étant dominée par un oligopole d’une trentaine de clubs européens. Deux modèles de financement des clubs distincts et évolutifs coexistent dans le football européen. Le fonctionnement du modèle d’ensemble engendre de manière récurrente le déficit et l’endettement financier de nombreux clubs ayant entraîné la mise en œuvre du fair play financier par l’UEFA.

In the literature, several articles have focused on the socioeconomic and sporting determinants of national men's football team performance measured through FIFA points. In the present paper, knowledge improvement comes from focusing on goal difference in individual games. The main objectives are to verify that game outcomes have some determinants similar to FIFA points but also game specific variables (home advantage and sporting prizes). The methodology is based on regressions including all games over the 2011–2013 period (2,584 observations). The results confirm that game outcomes have some determinants similar to FIFA points but also game specific variables.