Managment Deportivo

XOPHΓIA – CHOREGIA
Sport Management International Journal

Scientific Forum in Sport Management

SMIJ – VOL. 7, Number 2, 2011

D.O.I: http:dx.doi.org/10.4127/ch.2011.0057 Ehsan Javanmardi 1, Dr. Kazem Noghondarian2
1

A Study of Factors Affecting the Demand for Watching Football in Stadius

2

Management Department, Shiraz University, Iran College of Industrial Engineering, IranUniversity of Science and Technology, Tehran, Iran

Abstract
This paper is to find the factors effective on football matches watching demand in stadiums. The factors effective on the demand are divided into 4 categories; economical, environmental, appeal, and geographical / demographical factors which converted into 23 independent parameters by virtue of the device appropriate to gather relatedinformation. In this research, Iranian super league was selected as the subject of the study and We limited our study to three cities; Shiraz, Isfahan, and Tehran. Finally by virtue of estimating the regressions and estimating the Ordinary Least Square and Minitab software three equations were gained to foresee the number of the spectators. Validation of the models was conducted by lack of fittest, studies on the remnants such as Darling - Anderson test of normality, and Durbin Watson statistics for remnant independence test and the issue of their variance being fixed, and the study of lack of complex collinearity between independent variables using Variance Inflation Factor (VIF). We used step - by - step regression method and regression of all probable conditions. By virtue of theconclusions of the regression equations we found that there is a structural difference between capital and the cities and the factors creating attractions such as their recent successes, history and the quality of the teams have the most effects on the fans’ demand to attend in the stadiums.

Key Words: Regression analysis, attendance demand, demand for football.

6

SMIJ – VOL. 7, Number 2, 2011These days, the role of economic factors in football is undeniable and it is the attendance of spectators and club fans which leads to the increase of the income of the clubs and improvement in their economic situation. A study of the revenue of 21 clubs in Brazil suggests that 8% of the income of the clubs comes directly through selling tickets [1]. Besides, 29% of the income was due to TVbroadcasts and 17% came from the financial supporters of the clubs. According to a research conducted by Baranzini (2008) [2], TV channels, financial supporters, and sponsors mostly go to the clubs for which there is more demand on the side of the spectators.

Literature Review
Studying spectators’ demand in football was first introduced by Hart and his colleagues (1975) [3]. He studied theeffect of human and geographical factors as well as the success of clubs on the spectators’ demand in four football leagues in England. In the same year, Rivett studied the effect of population factor and success on the average number of spectators in each season using a minimum square error estimator [4]. In 1982, Bird, using the data he had compiled from 1948 to 1975 from the league of England,examined the role of ticket price, time of matches, national revenues, and other variables including the success of England in the World Cup competitions [5]. In 1994, Welki and his colleague Zelatoper fitted the number of the spectators of each football match against 14 independent factors including victories of the host team in a season [6]. In 1995, Dobson and Goddard assumed the logarithm of thenumber of spectators as the dependent variable and introduced a regression model with 3 principle and 9 secondary variables [7]. Following their research, in 1999, Jones and his colleagues designated 36 variables and studied the effect of these variables on the spectators’ demand for the rugby matches in England [8]. After that, in 2002, Forrest and Simmons studied the effect of probabilities and...