A data-driven treatise on football, with a slightly misleading title. In fact, they argue that England overperforms for its size.
The book is a collection of analyses – the title of ‘why England always lose’ is only one chapter so does not explain the other curiosities enclosed. As with the book called Freakonomics this book would have been better entitled ‘Soccernomics’. It covers sociological, behavioural and economic factors of international football.
This book is meant to be intellectual without feeling academic. Alas, there is at times an overload of statistics that makes it dry and incongruous with the popular style, drowned out. There is much to enjoy about its analysis of the penalty kick and the size of a club against its success, how a club’s success is highly correlated with its wage bill, but then the authors go on into hypothetical detail that sends ideas down rabbit holes of disinterest. What this is not is a fan love letter to football.
As a book from 2009, it is outdated – the FA Cup faded as a key point in English football a long time ago. The Champions League and its children – the Conference – are what clubs aim for through their position in the Premier League. Money – as shown by Manchester City’s Middle East owners – is king. Ownership is a means of soft politics for the reputation of Middle Eastern countries. The gradual political takeover of the World Cup with the bizarre award of a peace prize to President Trump (of all people) is a new factor in international politics.
The book’s highlights are its take-down of received wisdom. It argues that most managers have very little impact on a team’s long-term success, and that the transfer market is driven more by herd mentality than by actual value. However, this logic is now, ironically, probably binned by the advanced use of data, which clubs like Brighton HA have expertly proved with their transfer policy.
Not every hypothesis they argue for works. The argument that “Industrial Cities Dominate” over capitals like London, which have historically lagged behind industrial powerhouses (like Manchester), tying success directly to industrial working-class roots, feels like an age ago – look at Arsenal. What about tiny clubs like Bournemouth?
But it was the chapter on suicide that was a low point in the book; it felt pointless and unnecessary as a subject matter alongside that of penalties. Trying to relate suicide to the ebb and flow of football felt inappropriate and didn’t work. The final chapters on poverty and the performance of small countries at football globally take the book beyond levels of interest with its research.
There is no doubt that the authors, a football journalist and an economist, are fascinated by this mash-up of football and economics. The analysis of subjects such as racism in English football makes this book attractive to readers who want an academic breakdown of the industry of football. Racism in football is a subject carefully handled, but one that has largely been reduced alongside the violent side of football (not discussed in this book), but still an issue in other ways, such as the lack of black coaches; but whether this translates into a popular book (rather than a research book) is questionable.
However hard the authors try to popularise the economics and data of football, making it readable, however much they succeed, with its lightness of touch, it fails to bring the analysis alive. There are plenty of ideas that work, but others that disappear down their own data.
