Coach Mid-Season Replacement and Team Performance in Professional Soccer

• Authors: Carlos Lago-Peñas
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The coaching carousel or turnover is an extreme but frequently occurring phenomenon in soccer. Among the reasons for firing a coach, the most common is the existence of a shock-effect: a new coach would be able to motivate the players better and therefore to improve results. Using data from the Spanish Soccer League during the seasons from 1997-1998 to 2006-2007, this paper investigates the relationship between team performance and coach change over time. The empirical analysis shows that the shock effect of a turnover has a positive impact on team performance in the short term. Results reveal no impact of coach turnover in the long term. The favourable short-term impact on team performance of a coach turnover is followed by continued gradual worsening of results. The turnover effect is non-existent when the comparison between the new coach and the old coach is done over 10, 15 or 20 matches before and after termination.

Keywords

EN

coach change; soccer; team performance; short term

• Publisher: De Gruyter Open
• Journal: Journal of Human Kinetics
• Year: 2011
• Volume: 28
• Pages: 115-122

Dates

published

1 - 6 - 2011

online

4 - 7 - 2011

Contributors

author

Carlos Lago-Peñas

• Faculty of Education and Sports Sciences, University of Vigo, Pontevedra, Spain

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Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/v10078-011-0028-7