Researchers took advantage of the lack of public during the pandemic and found that teams get better numbers when they play at home
Corinthians fans celebrate a team goal in a game against Sao Paulo at the Neo Quimica ArenaThe characteristic of football is that teams perform better in home games. it’s hard to beat flamengo in Maracana, the Corinthians In the Neo Chemistry Arena, o santos In Villa and many other examples. With fans present, players will have extra energy to achieve results, weighing more willpower than acting in the opponent’s stadium. Therefore crowd 12th player is considered. This is something that studies on game dynamics have always taken into account. But it is difficult to measure. Which fan clubs would risk the championship in the name of experimentation and accept playing in their empty stadiums? NS global pandemicHowever, it gave the researchers the opportunity to see how much a full bleachers really meant.
In a recent study by the University of Leeds United Kingdom, searched the results of 4,844 matches played in the 11 most important championships in Europe. The list includes not only the main ones, such as Premier League, from England, and championships the Spanishhandjob German I Italiano, as competitions that receive less attention, such as the national leagues of Russia and Turkey. As is still the case in Brazil, spectator attendance at European stadiums was restricted at the start of the pandemic due to the risk of contamination. But, even before the vaccination, the German championship had resumed the presence of fans at the games. The last eurocupIn Portugal, all matches had spectators. Even the arrival of the delta version didn’t change the release.
This allowed the researchers to compare how teams behave in games with and without their fans in the stadium. The results show that fan Almost all positively affect statistics. For example, in each home match, teams scored 0.39 goal points more than they played away. In every five games, there were two more points on the table. Without fans, the profit dropped to 0.22 points. In the same five matches, he got only one point. He scored one more goal in every four home matches than in away matches. Without fans, he had to play seven times at home to reach the same goal. The absence of spectators also affects the judges, who schedule more fouls in empty stadiums. They also award fewer yellow cards, even if one team is clearly making more mistakes. And they expel even less.
What separates the study from other data Football, as the number of corners and shots on goal to show that, without fans present, the team’s performance is worse. Which highlights an important psychological component of football: the bond between fans and players. In Scream, some miracle has already happened. Impossible turns, victories against a strong opponent … there is no shortage of examples. With the stands empty, objective factors such as team quality weigh more, reducing the advantage of playing at home.
