The early bird catches the worm: : The impact of first‐mover advantage on long‐term elite team sport success

GND
130030538
ORCID
0000-0001-8649-8695
Affiliation
Institute for Sport Science, Friedrich‐Schiller‐University Jena
Daumann, Frank;
ORCID
0000-0002-6253-9322
Affiliation
Seeburg Castle University Salzburg Austria
Follert, Florian;
GND
104918002X
ORCID
0000-0002-2296-4316
Affiliation
Institute for Sport Science, Friedrich‐Schiller‐University Jena
Hamacher, Daniel;
GND
1316988333
Affiliation
Institute for Sport Science Friedrich‐Schiller‐University Jena Jena Germany
Plöhn, Lasse

The research on success factors in elite sport focuses primarily on the one hand to sport in its entirety and on the other hand to the prediction of success in individual sporting events, especially in soccer. In this paper, we investigate the existence of a first‐mover advantage for national team sports, which has a long‐term impact on a nation's success in a sport. To this end, we hand‐collected data for soccer and rugby and analyzed our sample concerning a first‐mover advantage. To do this, we examined the relationship between the date of establishment of each national sports association and later success as measured by the country's world ranking. We check for the essential macro determinants such as GDP per capita and population. Our study shows empirical evidence that the first‐mover advantage has a stronger effect on the success of a state in a team sport than the macro factors mentioned. In this way, we complement previous research on team sports by considering a hitherto neglected effect, a long‐term perspective and by including rugby.

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