Identification of Segments of Soccer Clubs in the Spanish League First Division with a Latent Class Model Carlos Pestana Barros a; Julio del Corral b and Pedro Garcia-del-Barrio c a ISEG – School of Economics and Management, Technical University of Lisbon, Rua Miguel Lupi, 20, 1249-078 Lisbon, Portugal; Email:
[email protected] b Departamento de Economía-Fundación Observatorio Económico del Deporte; Universidad de Oviedo; Avda. del Cristo s/n; 33006 Oviedo, Spain, Email:
[email protected] c Universitat Internacional de Catalunya; c/ Immaculada 22; 08017 Barcelona; Email:
[email protected] Accepted for publication in the Journal of Sports Economics Cite as: Pestana Barros, C., del Corral, J. and Garcia-del-Barrio, P. (2008). Identification of Segments of Soccer Clubs in the Spanish League First Division With a Latent Class Model. Journal of Sports Economics 9(5): 451-469. Abstract: This paper identifies different groups in a cost function framework of soccer clubs in the Spanish Football League First Division. In particular, we have clustered the sample - comprising data for seasons 1994/95 to 2004/05 - into three groups. To do so, we have implemented a stochastic frontier latent class model, a procedure that also permits us to analyze also the efficiency of the clubs with respect to their own frontiers. The results reveal that some of the clubs could improve their efficiency levels substantially. Keywords: cost efficiency, latent class model, soccer, stochastic frontier. Acknowledgments We are grateful to two anonymous referees for the helpful comments received. We express our gratitude to Angel Barajas, Miguel Cardenal, Joaquín Serrano, Carlos del Campo and Emilio García-Silvero for their support.