Sport, as we know it today, has come a long way. There were times when watching sports on television was considered a big step forward in terms of technology. Fast forward 60 years, watching sports on television has become the most basic thing. Today we watch sports on the go on our mobile phones or on any device with a screen and Internet connectivity. Proud of how far we’ve come, right? I hope I can change your opinion on this at the end of this article.
What is sport about? Sports are a group of people who come together to play a game with predefined rules and a referee to make sure these rules are followed during the course of the game. I am a sports lover and I play sports all the time. My love for tennis and soccer in particular cannot be defined. My problem when it came to advanced technology and analytics was with soccer in particular. Soccer is such a beautiful game. The strategies that the coaches come up with and the way the players execute them on the field is actually a beautiful thing. I was a soccer player myself (just an average one) and have been part of several teams. I know first-hand how strategies are built, how much is thought about in a single execution.
Enter -> Advanced Analysis
Most of you would have seen the movie Moneyball. The film was based on the book Michael Lewis wrote in 2003. It tells of how an athlete-turned-luminary uses advanced statistics to gain a competitive advantage over his better-funded opponents. This book sparked a revolution in sports. Fans and football club boards no longer wanted to settle for poor statistics or analysis. What Moneyball did was use an old cliché: “sports is business” and moved us to the next logical question: “How do we do things smarter?”
Now let’s talk about advanced analytics. Advanced analytics in today’s world plays a critical role in all business sectors. Advanced analytics has been a blessing for us. In moving from descriptive analytics to prescriptive analytics, we have actually come a long way. In many businesses, where the requirement is demanding, advanced analytics is of the utmost importance.
When we look at football, it is a game that does not require too much artificial intelligence, it is a game that needs the human element. When you incorporate analytics and technology and try to reduce the human element in sports, it just crushes the spirit of the game.
Relying on analytics largely killed off the Premier League long ball game and brought in the continual and pressing passing tiki-taka. Each league had its own style of play. The Premier League had the cheeky and cheeky style of soccer that was dubbed “The Way Real Men Play Soccer.” There were beautiful long balls, hard tackles, but all the players just held on, walked away and it was all up to the referee on the court to punish the offender or not. There were arguments and fights, the passion of the fans was crazy, that was football that screamed with passion, when players put themselves in the face of other players without fear of punishment. Those of Eric Cantona, those of Ivan Genaro Gattuso, the Jaap Stam of the football world soon disappeared and the diving and biting began. Then there was the tiki-taka style of soccer that was played in the Spanish League, the silky style of play that caught everyone off guard. The mythical Pep Guardiola and his army in Barcelona were the masters of tiki-taka. There was Real Madrid, which was always a star-studded lineup with excessive parts of their game relying on lightning-fast counters that, in most cases, left opponents stunned. There was Manchester United, which had its own brand of football under the leadership of the legendary Sir Alex Ferguson. That United team was a team of sheer courage and character. Each of these leagues had their own beauty and the teams had their own style of play.
When you bring in excessive technology and analytics, lamentable technologies like VARs (Video Assistant Referees) emerge.
There are 3 stages on how the VAR works:
Step 1
Incident occurs
The referee informs the VAR, or the VAR recommends to the referee that a decision / incident should be reviewed.
Step 2
VAR review and advice
The video is reviewed by the VAR, who informs the referee through headphones what the video shows.
Step 3
A decision or action is taken
The referee decides to review the video images on the side of the field of play before taking the appropriate action / decision, or the referee accepts the information from the VAR and makes the appropriate action / decision.
Now the referee can consult with the VAR basically any doubt that he wants to clarify. What does this?
• Remove the human element from the game.
• It takes too much time and generates too many stoppages within the game, a game that previously flowed freely and was continuous.
This makes it similar to Formula 1 racing. Analyzes that resulted in fuel weight control systems and numerous pit stops eliminated race continuity and reduced viewership with increased technology. A fairly similar trend could occur in soccer if this implementation becomes mandatory.
The bright side of advanced analytics in football:
Analytics is not that bad in football. Take the case when Simon Wilson joined Manchester City in 2006. Simon Wilson was initially a consultant for an analytics company called Prozone. He joined City to start an analytics department and hired top data analysts under his direction. I wanted to change the way soccer teams used data. He saw that, after a loss, there was no introspection about why they had lost and what to do next time. City was a half table club at the time. In September 2008, when the club was acquired by the Abu Dhabi United Group for Development and Investment, a private equity group owned by a member of the Abu Dhabi royal family, the team suddenly found itself with the resources to set up a challenge for the Premier League. Today, Wilson is Manchester City’s manager of strategic performance analysis. He has five departments under him, including the performance analysis team, which is now led by a sports scientist named Ed Sulley.
After each game, the team’s performance data would be examined. The list is extensive. Line jumps (a rugby term), ball possession, passing success rates, ball gain / loss ratio were what used to be analyzed. “Instead of looking at a list of 50 variables, we want to find five, let’s say, that really matter to our style of play,” says Pedro Marques, Manchester City match analyst.
“With the right data sources, the algorithms will generate statistics that have a strong relationship with winning and losing.” Wilson recalls one period in particular when Manchester City had not scored from the corners in more than 22 games, so his team decided to analyze more than 400 goals that were scored from the corners. It was noted that about 75 percent was due to inward curves, the kind where the ball curves toward goal. The next 12 games next season saw City score nine goals from the corner.
Teams are investing heavily in analytics today and it is working in their favor. Look where Manchester City is today, sitting at the top of the Premier League table and not being threatened at all. Look at Manchester United this season, their game has been such that their possession percentages are low but their goal conversions are high. The Manchester Derby on April 7, 2018 saw United have only 35% possession, but they managed to beat City 3-2. Each team has its set of analysts who provide information based on the strength of the team.
Advanced analytics is like Two Face’s coin in Batman, “Heads die, Tails survive!”
It can reap insane rewards from a team’s point of view, but at the same time it can interrupt the delightful gameplay by causing unnecessary stoppages, replays, and removing the human element. The numerous replays and the different angles show fans whether or not the referee made a mistake. Let the mistake happen, after all, to err is human. Refereeing in soccer is not an exact science and everything is in real time. Let there be discussions about a decision, let the passion in the discussion manifest. Do you want to watch a football match like El Classico or the Manchester Derby and sit with your group of friends and say “it was a very clean match, the best team won!” Hell NO! Do not eliminate the passion of soccer with technology and analysis. Let soccer be soccer and let technology stay away!