Footy clubs can't buy success (yet), study finds

Professor Borland - 03 8344 5294 or via - Ryan Sheales - (media office) - 0402 351 412 The study - AFL team performance and football expenditure - looked at the football department spending and on-field success of AFL clubs between 1994 and 2011. It found that, over recent years, clubs that spent 10 percent above average on their football departments enjoyed a 9.5 percent increase in their winning ratio during the home-and-away season. The chance of winning a premiership jumped by 7 percent. "Spending currently explains only a relatively small proportion of the variation in AFL teams' performances," according to lead researcher Professor Jeff Borland , from the University of Melbourne's Faculty of Business and Economics. But the research did find that the impact of money on success is growing stronger. "In the mid-1990s and early 2000s the relation between clubs' spending and their performances was too small to be accurately measured," Professor Borland said. "But by the late 2000s the relation was stronger and had become statistically significant." The research team - which also includes Professor Ross Booth from Monash University - believes the AFL is correct to be seeking to address differences in spending between clubs.