ArticleSports (Basel, Switzerland)2021
How Relative Age Effects Associate with Football Players' Market Values: Indicators of Losing Talent and Wasting Money.
Article in Sports (Basel, Switzerland), 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed.
- Relative age effects in Rugby union and Rugby league: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2026Review
- Positional relative age effect in europe's top ten football leagues.BMC sports science, medicine & rehabilitation · 2025Article
- Is There a Relative Age Effect among the Most Successful Track and Field Athletes?Journal of human kinetics · 2024Article
- The relative age effect is widespread among European adult professional soccer players but does not affect their market value.PloS one · 2023Article
- The relationships between relative age effect, personality constructs and achievement level in soccer.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2023Article
- Special Issue "Talent Identification and Development in Youth Sports".Sports (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Low prevalence of relative age effects in Luxembourg's male and female youth football.PloS one · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundIn football, annual age-group categorization leads to relative age effects (RAEs) in talent development. Given such trends, relative age may also associate with market values. This study analyzed the relationship between RAEs and market values of youth players.
methodsAge category, birthdate, and market values of 11,738 youth male football players were obtained from the "transfermarkt.de" database, which delivers a good proxy for real market values. RAEs were calculated using odds ratios (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (95%CI).
resultsSignificant RAEs were found across all age-groups (
conclusionsAssuming an equal distribution of football talent exists across annual cohorts, results indicate the selection and market value of young professional players is dynamic. Findings suggest a potential biased selection, and undervaluing of Q4 players in younger age groups, as their representation and market value increased over time. By contrast, the changing representations and market values of Q1 players suggest initial overvaluing in performance and monetary terms. Therefore, this inefficient talent selection and the accompanying waste of money should be improved.
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Registered trials
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