Shakiez
Recently, in data analytics in all industries Artificial Intelligence (AI) has taken a top spot in the ranks. It has been transforming the football world with the help of different AI models (Zone7 and Deepmind).
With AI, so many football clubs worldwide are changing how they scout opponents, recruit new players, improve player’s performance, and detect foul play during matches.
The rise in data analysis in football, from club level to officiating, has created the perfect environment for machine learning.
AI can be trained to help spot patterns and detect errors in collected data that might otherwise be overlooked by humans. It also automates processes and aids in quick decision-making with much accuracy.
Artificial Intelligence is already been used in football in several ways which you may not know yet but this article explains it all.
Collecting Football Player Data?
A vast amount of data is now collected in football especially on player’s performance in each match, with hundreds of data points recorded on matchdays making this huge number of data to become complex for just humans to handle.
If you recall some years ago, football data was centered on matchday performances by players but a few as many were not taken into account. Players were rated but not with vivid statistics basically, the data taken into account were goals, passes, tackles, or shots.
This data was collected and analyzed by experts by watching the live event or the footage after the event before some decision could be made.
Well, in football focusing only on the match data has left a lot of other details regarding the event and one could not tell precisely what the entire 22 players are doing as the football match is ongoing.
That is where the use of AI comes into play, digital cameras are now been installed all around the stadium to monitor the movements and actions of every player on the pitch, giving football data analysts a full insight into the event also generating accurate data on players’ actions.
How does AI track data in football?
These computers are trained to detect and track each player’s action during a match. Although, played sometimes stands in the way of a recording camera’s angle the truth is this AI-oriented computers are advanced and accurate. It is a reliable gem that allows complex tracking of football data which records more details regarding players’ movement, positions, runs, touches, tackles, etc, in fact, it is much more detailed than any human analyst.
How Referees Use AI to Make Better Decisions?
Referees are tasked with a demanding job from fitness, good reflexes, and accurate decision-making. We have seen bad decisions taken by match officials which sometimes even costs a team in a crucial match.
If there had been a Video Assistant Referee (VAR) during the 1986 FIFA World Cup, Diego Maradona’s handball goal (hand of God) for Argentina against England would have been canceled.
● VAR is one of the important models used by FIFA currently to improve accuracy in football decision-making, is to assist match officials in detecting foul play and other related occurrences in the game.
● Semi-Automated Offside Technology (SAOT) newly introduced officiating system, that is built with 12 cameras around it installed in the stadiums to track the position of the ball and player 50 times per second with the use of AI sensor placed inside the ball.
When SAOT detects an offside, it sends a signal to the VAR officials for confirmation and decisions. SAOT’s help matches officials detect offside and player positions before the ball is kicked, helping them to do a thorough check to avoid wrong decisions.
SAOT was first used during the 2022-23 Champions League group stage and at the 2022 World Cup with with great success recorded. It has not altered but improved the decision-making of referees, alerting officials on information that they can use to take the right action.
● Goal line technology, there have been many controversial goals in football history concerning the goal line in the past, touchline goals were just the referee’s decision just like any other but nowadays the use of AI helps referees to detect a goal easily, once a ball passes the goal line it sends an instant signal to the referees who feels a vibration on his wrist watch allowing him to make the right call of action.
How Football Clubs Use AI to Keep Players Fit?
Due to regular matches in modern-day football, especially players who play in domestic, continental, and international competitions, it is very useful to have a piece of knowledge on the fitness level of your team and manage any injury risks on time.
Read Also: Paul Pogba’s brother’s sentence for Extortion and Blackmail.
For instance, Zone7 is an American data company that helps players increase their performance levels while avoiding injury. Noticeably, Los Angeles FC, is certain that the AI model has helped the football club to win the MLS champions in 2022 by keeping them in a maximum performing shape and reducing injuries per game played by 17%.
How Zone7 uses AI for player’s fitness?
Zone7 is to analyze the data of players, point out patterns that show the possibility of when they might get injured, and the cause of these injuries “It retrospectively utilizes the data given to it in the past season(s) example; GPS data, injury record, etc” these were the areas revealed by Gavin Benjafield, LFC’s Performance Director.
Zone7 is a model on the rise in usage by several other football clubs like Napoli and Leeds United well known to be employing at the moment to ascertain players’ fitness.
Deepmind has been a game changer for Liverpool during the spell of Jurgen Klopp since the club’s takeover by the Fenway Sports Group in 2010, the club has systematically used this Artificial Intelligence initiative for data analytics in football and had huge success. Developers of this injury and fitness-detecting technology were invented by scientists from Harvard and Cambridge University. With the help of this, Klopp had success during his spell at the club winning the Premier League, Champions League, FA Cup, and other unofficial trophies.
This has increased the voltage of LFC in collaborating with DeepMind, an artificial intelligence company and research laboratory owned by Google to optimize their player’s output in general.
With this innovative idea, Liverpool FC has grown in football players’ data analysis and currently has one of the biggest and most-developed analytics departments in football,” according to Ian Graham, the club’s Director of Research, Liverpool is enjoying DeepMind which was invented by Demis Hassabis, who is a fan of the club.
With DeepMind and Zone7 technology on players’ data football clubs now analyze opponents’ reactions before matches and make tactical changes and formations to counter such opponents maximizing the team’s general performance.
Professor Karl Tuyls who’s an expert and a research team member of football technology said: “I don’t think you will see big impacts in the next six months or a year, but in the next five years some of the tools will be more developed, and you could see something like an ‘Automated Video Assistant Coach’ that can help with pre-match and post-match analysis or can look at the first half of a game and give you advice on what could be changed in the second half.”
AI will take over most of the referee’s jobs in football so to say, as the innovations get even better in years to come.
