May 3 – ‘Points mean prizes’ as the old gameshow catchphrase goes. In football’s version of the gameshow the phrase would more accurately be ‘money wins prizes’ according to the latest analysis of the CIES Football Observatory.
The CIES looked at the results of big-5 league teams according to their transfer spend on buying in players over the 2016/17 season. A clear correlation was measured between fees paid and points per match in all five leagues with the link between money and success being undeniable.
The report highlights: “Three teams performed much better than the amounts invested on the transfer market would have suggested: West Bromwich Albion, Atalanta and Freiburg. The most positive gaps in the French Ligue 1 were recorded for Nantes and Nice. Eibar and Alavés are at the top of the table at Spanish Liga level.”
While more money spent means more success is perhaps not a ground-breaking conclusion, what is of value in the analysis is to look at who is pending their money most effectively. “The club having so far the most under-performed with regard to its expenditure in signing players fielded is Wolfsburg. Results obtained by Valencia, Bayer Leverkusen, Hamburg and Sunderland were also clearly disappointing. The same holds true for Bastia in France, as well as for Inter and Palermo in Italy,” said the report.
Source: CIES Football Observatory
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