For managers of sports leagues, it is crucial to produce an attractive competition. For that to happen, it is vital to consider that leagues frequently have more sub-competitions than “just” the championship. In European top football leagues, for instance, four sub-competitions are common (championship, qualification for Champions- or Europa League, avoiding relegation). This paper introduces a new method for measuring competitive intensity (CI) in round-robin sports leagues considering all relevant sub-competitions and applies it to Germany's Bundesliga.
The newly developed model calculates a CI-Index for each sub-competition and the league as a whole. The application to the Bundesliga analyzes its viability and the development of the league's CI over the past 22 seasons.
The newly introduced CI-Indices prove to be a viable tool for evaluating a league's competitive intensity. The application to the Bundesliga shows that the seasonal CI dropped after 2009/10, which can mainly be attributed to a decline in the championship's CI.
The results show that it is important to facilitate a high CI in each of Bundesliga's four sub-competitions. Efforts have to be made to ensure that especially the Europa League remains as attractive as possible for the participating teams and their fans because this sub-competition constantly makes the greatest contribution to the seasonal CI.
The new method measures competitive intensity by quantifying the different sub-competitions and their contribution to the seasonal CI. This allows the organizers of sports leagues to assess the intensity of the individual sub-competitions as well as the league as a whole.
