Home Advantage: Comparison between the Major European Football Leagues

In all professional team sports, the team playing at home derives an advantage, so, the home advantage is an important factor to consider in the competition sport. The home advantage concept is represented by the consistency that the teams win more than 50% of the matches at home. The aim of this study is to analyze the importance of playing at home for the final outcome of the games, making an analysis and comparison of this variable among the top 10 European national football leagues in the 2015-2016 season, totaling 3,223 analyzed games. The data were obtained through a Soccerstats site. To quantify the home advantage, the recovery methodology percentage of points was used. According to the results found, all leagues analyzed showed advantage for teams that have played at home, with a percentage of point gains above 50%. The average percentage found in this study for the home advantage was 58.25±2.95% of the total points accumulated. However, this study presents a slightly lower index compared with similar studies. This may suggest a reduction of that variable over time. Thus, it can be concluded that playing at home in the major European leagues also brings an advantage to the final outcome of the game. Possible factors contributing to this phenomenon are presented.