6 Conclusion
Tournament-style rivalry between agents, whether based on specified performance criteria
or perceived talent and ability as in the nomination contests for national soccer teams,
arises in many contexts. Firms often explicitly choose relative performance evaluation
schemes akin to tournaments in order to provide incentives to employees. In other situ-
ations, the principal’s only goal is to select the most suitable agent, but this may create
similar incentives. In both cases, economic theory predicts that agents should exert higher
effort the closer the race. This paper provides empirical evidence for this prediction. We
show that players from nations qualified for the Euro 2008 who had been called upon
by the national coach in some but not too many recent national team matches improved
their performance, relative to players of other nationalities with a similar standing in
their national teams, after their countries’ qualifications. For players without any recent
national team nominations, on the other hand, there is no evidence of any improvement
relative to players of other nationalities.
Moreover, our evidence suggests that players who were already quite certain of their
Euro Cup participations actually performed worse along several dimensions than they
would have in the absence of the upcoming Cup. The likely cause is that these players
want to avoid injuries and more generally preserve their strength and fitness for the Cup.
Hence, while the clubs often benefit from the national team nomination contests, they
may actually suffer losses in the case of top players. Similar effects can occur in other
situations where agents compete for a position that requires effort in the future instead
of for a monetary prize. Consider promotion contests in firms for example. An employee
who expects an almost certain promotion into a different unit may be inclined to work
less hard in his current position not only because of ”last-round” effects but also because
the employee wants to preserve energy for his/her new position. Such behavior clearly
inflicts a loss on the employee’s current unit.
Finally, this paper adds to the empirical literature testing the predictions of career
concerns models by providing evidence that the effect of the Euro 2008 qualification on
individual performance was stronger for younger players than for older players. There
are two possible theoretical explanations for this. First, the national coach may have a
less firmly established opinion of younger players than of older player, who may therefore
have greater chances of influencing the coach’s decision by their performances. Second,
post Euro Cup career concerns may be more important for younger players, who hence
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