No Home Bias in Ghost Games

Because of the COVID-19-pandemic the men’s first German football league (Bundesliga) had to take a break before it was permitted to finish the season 2019/20. However, only ghost games without spectators in the stadiums were allowed in this finishing phase. Comparing these 83 games without spectators with the corresponding 83 regular games between the same teams with spectators before, we find that the normal advantage for the home team disappears. There were 48.2% home wins with spectators and only 32.5% without. This decrease is statistically significant. There were 32.5% away wins before the break and 44.6% thereafter, while the draws increased from 19.3% to 22.9%. However, these increases are not statistically significant. One reason for the lost home advantage is the disappearance of a home bias by the referees, who gave significantly less extra time and also less yellow and red cards to the away team. Keywords: Bundesliga, COVID-19, football, ghost games, home bias

The Behaviour of Home Advantage during the COVID-19 Pandemic in European Rink Hockey Leagues

The primary purpose of the present study was to compare the home advantage (HA) and the home team performance in the most relevant European rink hockey leagues (Spanish, Portuguese and Italian), considering the presence or absence of spectators in the competition venues due to the effect of COVID-19 restrictions. The sample was composed of 1665 rink hockey matches (654 from the Spanish league, 497 from the Portuguese league, and 514 from the Italian league) played between the 2018–2019 and 2020–2021 seasons. The HA and match variables comparisons were established using several negative binomial regression models. Results showed that the effect of HA did not disappear despite playing without spectators but decreased from 63.99% to 57.41% (p = 0.002). Moreover, the comparison of the match variables showed that playing with spectators benefited local teams’ performance, especially in the Portuguese and Italian leagues. Playing with spectators favoured local team performance in rink hockey matches, which is more evident in some analysed leagues. However, as HA does not disappear entirely without spectators, it is necessary to study other relevant performance factors that are not directly or indirectly attributable to crowd behaviour in rink hockey performance analyses.

The Level Of Anxiety’s Referees Of Langsa (Football Association Of Indonesia) When Enforcing The Laws Of The Game During A Match

Football is a popular sport that is loved by all levels of society and throughout the world. A football match always engages a referee who enforces the game to oversee the course of the game consisting of the head referee and assistant referee. This article discusses the level of anxiety of the C-3 soccer referee at the PSSI Askot Langsa City, which amounted to 26 people. The research method used is descriptive quantitative with a survey approach. This study was to figure out information on the anxiety level of the C-3 referee while leading the match; the results showed 17 referees with a percentage of 65% in the high anxiety category and nine referees with a portion of 35% in the very high category. Factors that affect the referee's anxiety are the audience pressure factor. The high atmosphere of the match when the home team is competing and the human error factor from the referee itself is appeared because the referee hesitates in making decisions so that the same mistakes are repeated by head referee and assistant referee during a match underway.

Patient Vs. Soldier-Centered Medical Home: Comparing Access, Continuity, and Communication in the U.S. Army

ABSTRACT Introduction Over the last 40 years, patient-centered medical home (PCMH) has evolved as the leading primary care practice model, replacing traditional primary care models in the United States and internationally. The goal of PCMH is to improve chronic condition management. In the U.S. Army, the scope of the medical home, which encompasses various care delivery platforms, including PCMH and soldier-centered medical home (SCMH), extends beyond the management of chronic illnesses. These medical home platforms are designed to support the unique health care needs of the U.S. Army’s most vital asset—the soldier. The PCMHs and SCMHs within the U.S. Army employ patient-centered care principles while incorporating nationally recognized structural attributes and care processes that work together in a complex adaptive system to improve organizational and patient outcomes. However, U.S. Army policies dictate differences in the structures of PCMHs and SCMHs. Researchers suggest that differences in medical home structures can impact how organizations operationalize care processes, leading to unwanted variance in organizational and patient outcomes. This study aimed to compare 3 care processes (access to care, primary care manager continuity, and patient-centered communication) between PCMHs and SCMHs. Materials and Methods This was a retrospective, cross-sectional, and correlational study. We used a subset of data from the Military Data Repository collected between January 1, 2018, and December 31, 2018. The sample included 266 medical home teams providing care for active duty soldiers. Only active duty soldiers were included in the sample. We reviewed current U.S. Army Medical Department policies to describe the structures and operational functioning of PCMHs and SCMHs. General linear mixed regressions were used to evaluate the associations between medical home type and outcome measures. The U.S. Army Medical Department Center and School Institutional Review Board approved this study. Results There was no significant difference in access to 24-hour and future appointments or soldiers’ perception of access between PCMHs and SCMHs. There was no significant difference in primary care manager continuity. There was a significant difference in medical home team continuity (P < .001), with SCMHs performing better. There was no significant difference in patient-centered communication scores. Our analysis showed that while the PCMH and SCMH models were designed to improve primary care manager continuity, access to care, and communication, medical home teams within the U.S. Army are not consistently meeting the Military Health System standard of care benchmarks for these care processes. Conclusions Our findings comparing 3 critical medical home care processes suggest that structural differences may impact continuity but not access to care or communication. There is an opportunity to further explore and improve access to appointments within 24 hours, primary care manager and medical home team continuity, perception of access to care, and the quality of patient-centered communication among soldiers. Knowledge gained from this study is essential to soldier medical readiness.

A Machine Learning Approach to Analyze Home Advantage during COVID-19 Pandemic Period with Regards to Margin of Victory and to Different Tournaments in Professional Rugby Union Competitions

Home advantage (HA) is the tendency for sporting teams to perform better at their home ground than away from home, it is also influenced by the crowd support, and its existence has been well established in a wide range of team sports including rugby union. Among all the HA determinants, the positive contribute of the crowd support on the game outcome can be analyzed in the unique pandemic situation of COVID-19. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to analyze the HA of professional high-level rugby club competition from a complex dynamical system perspective before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. HA was analyzed in northern and southern hemisphere rugby tournaments with (2013–2019) and without (2020/21) crowd support by the means of the exhaustive chi-square automatic interaction detection (CHAID) decision trees (DT). HA was mitigated by the crowd absence especially in closed games, although differences between tournaments emerged. Both for northern and southern hemisphere, the effect of playing without the crowd support had a negative impact on the home team advantage. These findings evidenced that in ghost games, where differences in the final score were less than a converted try (7 points), HA has disappeared.

Social influence of spectators

Social influence has been summarised as the change in one’s beliefs, behaviour, or attitudes due to external pressure that may be real or imagined (Cialdini, 2001). In this chapter, we focus on the question of how (sports-relevant) behaviour and athletic performances are influenced by others, especially active and passive (sports) spectators. You have probably already experienced giving a presentation in front of a group of people. Were you influenced by the presence of your audience? Was your performance better, worse, or unaffected compared to the rehearsal session, when you practised alone? Is your performance influenced differently when the audience listens attentively as opposed to when they are noisily not paying attention? How does this presence of others impact performances and behaviours in the context of sports? In sports, social influence has already been investigated extensively (cf. Epting, Riggs, Knowles, & Hanky, 2011; cf. Strauss, 2002b). A particular interest within social influence research is the home advantage in team sports (Allen & Jones, 2014; Carron, Loughhead, & Bray, 2005). Research in this field is concerned with understanding whether the performance of the home team is better due to more of their fans being in the stadium.

Home advantage mediated (HAM) by referee bias and team performance during covid

The fans’ importance in sports is acknowledged by the term ‘the 12th man’, a figurative extra player for the home team. Sport teams are indeed more successful when they play in front of their fans than when they play away. The supposed mechanism behind this phenomenon, termed Home Advantage (HA), is that fans’ support spurs home players to better performance and biases referees, which in turn determines the outcome. The inference about the importance of fans’ support is, however, indirect as there is normally a 12th man of this kind, even if it is an opponent’s. The current pandemic, which forced sporting activities to take place behind closed doors, provides the necessary control condition. Here we employ a novel conceptual HA model on a sample of over 4000 soccer matches from 12 European leagues, some played in front of spectators and some in empty stadia, to demonstrate that fans are indeed responsible for the HA. However, the absence of fans reduces the HA by a third, as the home team’s performance suffers and the officials’ bias disappears. The current pandemic reveals that the figurative 12th man is no mere fan hyperbole, but is in fact the most important player in the home team.

P075 Travel or cheers? Examining the drivers and mechanisms of home court advantage in the 2020/2021 NBA regular season

Introduction Home court advantage (HCA) in the National Basketball Association (NBA) is well-documented, yet the co-occurring drivers responsible for this advantage have proven difficult to examine in isolation. The Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic resulted in the elimination of crowds in ~50% of games during the 2020/2021 NBA season, whereas travel remained unchanged. Using this ‘natural experiment’, we investigated the impact of crowds and travel-related sleep and circadian disruption on NBA HCA. Methods 1080 games from the 2020/2021 NBA regular season were analyzed using mixed models (fixed effects: crowds, travel; random effects: team, opponent). Results In games with crowds, home teams won 58.65% of the time and outrebounded (M=2.28) and outscored (M=2.18) their opponents. In games without crowds, home teams won significantly less (50.60%, p = .01) and were outrebounded (M=-0.41, p < .001) and outscored (M=-0.13, p < .05) by their opponents. Further, the increase in home rebound margin fully mediated the relationship between crowds and home points margin (p < .001). No significant sleep or circadian effects were observed. Discussion Taken together, these results suggest that HCA in the 2020/2021 NBA season was predominately driven by the presence of crowds and their influence on the effort exerted by the home team to rebound the ball. Moreover, we speculate that the strict NBA COVID-19 policies may have mitigated the travel-related sleep and circadian effects on the road team. These findings are of considerable significance to a domain wherein marginal gains can have immense competitive, financial, and even historical consequences.

O032 The influence of travel and recovery inequality on game outcome in the National Basketball Association

Introduction Elite athletes are often required to travel for National and International competitions. However, the direction (westwards or eastwards), time zones crossed, and recovery days relative to their opponents may influence team success. The aim of this study was to determine whether differences in jetlag-induced circadian misalignment and number of recovery days between National Basketball Association (NBA) teams influenced the subsequent game result. Methods A total of 11,598 games from the 2011/2012 to the 2020/2021 seasons were analysed using mixed models with two fixed effects (travel, recovery) and three random effects (team, opponent, game time). Mediation modelling was also performed to determine if any influence of the fixed effects were mediated by another variable. The data is presented from the home team’s perspective. Results Teams with more recovery days between games, won by larger margins (F = 5.0, p < 0.001). Compared to one fewer recovery day (1.45 ± 13.92), one more recovery day (3.53 ± 13.51) advantaged the home team by 2.08 points (d = 0.15). The effect of travel on greater home team margins was completely mediated via recovery day differences (95% CI -0.11 to -0.03, p = 0.002). Discussion Using 10 seasons of data, our findings show that regardless of travel, recovery days between games significantly impact game margins. An advantage in recovery days should be considered for teams who travel more time zones westwards relative to their opponent. This suggests inequalities of the NBA schedule may be minimised for future seasons.