Elite sport policies and international sporting success: a panel data analysis of European women’s national football team performance

Figures & data

Table 1. Summary of literature review about determinants of women’s football international performance.

Factor	Proxy	Klein (2002)	Hoffmann et al. (2006)	Torgler (2008)	Congdon-Hohman and Matheson (2011)	Cho (2013)	Jacobs (2014)		Brendtmann et al. (2016)
Programme-level							Short-term	Long-term
Human resources	Dummy: ≥3 FT Staff						+	+
Training availability	≥4 Senior weekly training sessions						+
Grassroots participation and foundation	Dummy: ≥7 Years of girls’ soccer in school							n.s.
Talent ID and development	Dummy: National youth team							n.s.
Talent ID and development	Dummy: ≥4 youth weekly training sessions							+
Country-level
Economic development	GDP/Capita	+	+	+	+ / n.s.	+	+		+
Population	Total population	+	+	+	+				+
	Female population					+
	Female population (15–64)						+
Climate	Average temperature		n.s.	-	-		-
	Dummy: Tropics								n.s.
Latin heritage	Dummy: Latin origin		n.s.		n.s.		n.s.
Gender equality	Female-to-male labour force	+			+		+
	% women in government	+			+
	Fertility rate	n.s.
	Female-to-male income		+
	Gender Inequality Index				+
	Female-to-male secondary enrolment				+
	Female labour force participation					+			+
	Life expectancy								+
Religion	Dummy: Muslim	n.s.			-
Political system	Dummy: Communism		+		+		n.s.
Men’s football legacy	Dummy: qualified for World Cup	+				n.s.	+
	Dummy: ever hosted World Cup		+	+
	FIFA Ranking		+	+
	FIFA Points				+	+
	Dummy: ever won World Cup			+

Note: dependent variable: women’s performance; (+) indicates a significant positive association; (-) indicates a negative significant negative association; (n.s.) indicates a non-significant association.

Table 2. Description and data sources of variables.

Variable	Proxy	Source
Women’s performance	FIFA Women’s World Ranking points	FIFA.com
Programme-level
Financial support	Budget for women’s football (Log)	UEFA (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017)
Human resources	Number of full-time staff
Coaching provision	Senior national team coach license UEFA Pro (dummy: 1- yes)
Foundation phase	Link clubs-school (dummy: 1 – yes)
Country-level
Economic development	GDP per capita (Log)	The World Bank (2017)
Talent pool	Total registered players (Log)	UEFA (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017)
Climate	(Yearly average temperature – 14°C)^2	Weatherbase.com (2017)
Democracy	Democracy Index	The Economist Intelligence Unit (2016)
Gender equality	Female-to-male labour force participation rate	The World Bank (2017)
Men’s football legacy	FIFA Men’s World Ranking points	FIFA.com

Table 3. Correlation matrix of selected variables.

		1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
1	Women’s performance
	Programme-level
2	Financial support	.77*
3	Human resources	.48*	.51*
4	Coaching provision	.34*	.33*	.11
5	Foundation phase	.21*	.27*	.21*	.24*
	Country-level
6	Economic development	.48*	.40*	.15*	.18*	.06
7	Talent pool	.83*	.82*	.46*	.31*	.16	.39*
8	Climate	.21*	.19*	.09	.00	.04	.20*	.24*
9	Democracy	.43*	.37*	.10	.29*	.22*	.78*	.49*	.03
10	Gender equality	.38*	.27*	.13*	.21*	.09	.36*	.20*	.40*	.36*
11	Men’s football legacy	.68*	.59*	.32*	.35*	.11	.15*	.66*	-.07	.30*	.04

Note: 1-year lag is used for Financial support, Human resources and Coaching provision; 5-year lag is used for Foundation phase.

*p < 0.05.

Table 4. Descriptive statistics of selected variables.

Variable	N		Mean	SD
Women’s performance	258	Overall	1563.88	278.43
		Between		289.45
		Within		26.56
Programme-level
Financial support	243	Overall	13.62	1.29
		Between		1.23
		Within		0.47
Human resources	249	Overall	5.40	6.63
		Between		4.99
		Within		4.20
Coaching provision	258	Overall	0.50	0.50
		Between		0.34
		Within		0.36
Foundation phase	93	Overall	0.53	0.51
		Between		0.52
		Within		0.27
Country-level
Economic development	258	Overall	9.88	0.91
		Between		0.97
		Within		0.09
Talent pool	258	Overall	8.70	1.83
		Between		1.84
		Within		0.45
Climate	258	Overall	39.08	40.24
		Between		39.53
		Within		0
Democracy	258	Overall	7.36	1.61
		Between		1.65
		Within		0.15
Gender equality	258	Overall	77.87	8.98
		Between		8.66
		Within		1.71
Men’s football legacy	258	Overall	721.76	330.56
		Between		314.64
		Within		129.01

Table 5. Panel regression tests for predictors of women’s football performance.

	Model 1		Model 2		Model 3
	Coeff. (SE)	Sign.	Coeff. (SE)	Sign.	Coeff. (SE)	Sign.
Coaching provision	13.68 (6.69)	**	13.68 (7.01)	*
Economic development	87.21 (20.34)	***	87.21 (32.57)	**	88.01 (20.49)	***
Talent pool	14.85 (5.08)	**	14.85 (10.79)		15.66 (5.13)	**
Climate	1.09 (.52)	**	1.09 (.79)		1.07 (.52)	**
Democracy	3.17 (11.99)		3.17 (16.18)		2.46 (12.07)
Gender equality	1.73 (1.25)		1.73 (1.77)		1.81 (1.27)
Men’s football legacy	.05 (.01)	**	.05 (.02)	**	.05 (.01)	**
Constant	319.33 (180.20)	*	319.33 (292.63)		310.38 (181.17)	*
Observations	258				258
Groups	48				48
Within-R^2	.01				.00
Between-R^2	.54				.54
Overall-R^2	.52				.52
rho	.91				.91

Note: Displayed are the coefficients (standard errors in parentheses) of random-effects estimator (through the command xtreg in Stata). Panel variable is country and time variable is year. 1-year lag predictor is used for Coaching provision. Results of Model 2 are based on bootstrap with 1,000 replications. The dependent variable is: Women’s football performance.

*p < 0.10; **p < 0.05; ***p < 0.001.

Klein, M. W. (2002). Work and play: International evidence of gender equality in employment and sports. NBER Working Paper No. 9081. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research.

 Google Scholar

Hoffmann, R., Ging, L., Matheson, V., & Ramasamy, B. (2006). International women’s football and gender inequality. Applied Economics Letters, 13(15), 999–1001. doi: 10.1080/13504850500425774

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Torgler, B. (2008). The determinants of women's international soccer performances. International Journal of Sport Management and Marketing, 3(4), 305–318. doi: 10.1504/IJSMM.2008.017208

 Google Scholar

Congdon-Hohman, J., & Matheson, V. (2011). International women’s soccer and gender inequality: Revisited. Working paper no. 11–07, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts.

 Google Scholar

Cho, S.-Y. (2013). A league of their own: Female soccer, male legacy and women’s empowerment. Paper presented at the DIW, January, Berlin.

 Google Scholar

Jacobs, J. C. (2014). Programme-level determinants of women`s international football performance. European Sport Management Quarterly, 14(5), 521–537. doi: 10.1080/16184742.2014.945189

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Brendtmann, J., Carsten, J. C., & Otten, S. (2016). The effect of gender equality on international soccer performance. International Journal of Sport Finance, 11(4), 288–309.

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

UEFA. (2011). Women’s football across the national associations 2011/12.

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2012). Women’s football across the national associations 2012/13.

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2013). Women`s football across the national associations 2013/14. Retrieved from http://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/Women/WFDP/02/03/17/67/2031767_DOWNLOAD.pdf

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2014). Women`s football across the national associations 2014/15. Retrieved from http://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/Women/General/02/03/27/84/2032784_DOWNLOAD.pdf

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2015). Women`s football across the national associations 2015/16. Retrieved from http://www.uefa.org/MultimediaFiles/Download/OfficialDocument/uefaorg/Women'sfootball/02/30/93/30/2309330_DOWNLOAD.pdf

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2016). Women`s football across the national associations 2016/17. Retrieved from https://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/OfficialDocument/uefaorg/Women'sfootball/02/43/13/56/2431356_DOWNLOAD.pdf

 Google Scholar

UEFA. (2017). Women’s football across the National Associations 2017. Retrieved from https://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/OfficialDocument/uefaorg/Women'sfootball/02/51/60/57/2516057_DOWNLOAD.pdf

 Google Scholar

The World Bank. (2017). World Bank open data. Retrieved from http://data.worldbank.org

 Google Scholar

Weatherbase.com. (2017). Country: Weather averages. Retrieved from http://www.weatherbase.com

 Google Scholar

The Economist Intelligence Unit. (2016). Democracy index 2016: Revenge of the “deplorables”. Retrieved from http://felipesahagun.es/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Democracy-Index-2016.pdf

 Google Scholar