Key Determinants of Football Players Value

This paper educates the impact of different determinants on football players transfer fee. Dataset includes transfers of defenders on midfielders that were bought by European top-5 league clubs in summer windows of 2015 and 2016. Models take into account some personal, performance and bargaining characteristics. Last one type factors do not influence on investment quality, that is why it can be the main source of overestimating and underestimating of transfer price. Country of buyer and seller (country premium) can be considered as this type of factors. According to results ceteris paribus EPL clubs buy at a highest price, while maximum of transfer fee reached when seller of defender is Spanish, of midfielder - Dutch Other significant factor is remaining length of player’s contract with seller. There is strong positive impact of this factor on transfer fee. Clubs might choose the optimal strategy of operation on transfer market with respect to these results.