Home advantage and crowd size in soccer: A worldwide study

Abstract

Home advantage is well documented in a wide range of team sports including association football (soccer). Crowd support appears to play a major role although the mechanisms through which it operates are unclear. Match data from major international club soccer competitions in four confederations of the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) were used to investigate the role crowd size plays in home advantage and how its effect may vary worldwide. Unadjusted home advantage did not vary significantly between continents. However, controlling for differences in crowd size produced highly significant (p<0.001) variation, with crowd adjusted home advantage -in terms of the percentage of goals scored by home teams -ranging from 56% in Europe to 67% in North America. For all continents combined, home advantage increased by 1.5% per each 10% increase in crowd size (p< 0.001). The effect of crowd size on home advantage in North America was twice that in other continents (p=0.03). A logarithmic association appears to best describe the effect of crowd size on home advantage in soccer. Directions for future research into home advantage include investigating the effects of other crowd factors such as density and proximity.