One of the most expressive riches of football is the ability to gather passion with technique. If for the crowd the goal is a moment of ecstasy, within the four lines it is the result of intermingling, good communication and precision in the plays. Each player plays a key role in the performance of the entire team. While making decisions individually with each pass, you should have a vision of the whole, including teammates and opponents.
In the field, each part makes up the whole and the whole is in each part. Individual and collective are not distinguished: they exist only through relationship. And this relationship reveals a large network over the lawns. It is to articulate these networks that coaches work; it is about them that journalists make analyzes; It is for them that a team wins and loses a championship. But how clear are these networks in the eyes of the public, the press, the coaches and the players themselves?
Network Sciences Applied to Football
From precise data mapping and visualization techniques, it is possible to analyze the performance of a team in the field. Network Science offers indicators commonly used in Organizational Network Analysis (ONA), which effectively reveal the workings of a team, be it corporate or sports.
Comparing the structure of a football team to a business group can be very illuminating in understanding the importance of informal leaders, bottlenecks, power grids, and the flow of information within an organization.
Tree Intelligence takes on this challenge by applying the Social Network Analysis (SNA) method to the 2014 World Cup matches through the Sport Network Analysis. The goal is to spell out the origin of the motivation, the processes of cooperation and the innovative spirit that companies so need in the Age of Interconnectivity.
Beyond the application to companies, analysis of football matches from the perspective of Data Science offers a much more assertive picture for managers, club coaches and the press about how a team works and the possibilities for rearticulation. From the analysis of expert netnographers, the unique game patterns of each team are revealed. Moreover, it is possible to arrive at a predictive view of the games, anticipating the performance that each player will have on the field in front of a specific opponent.
Communication
Understanding this complex web that forms through each pass exchange is left to clear visual representations of each field movement. Everything is mapped and translated into images: ball possession, fouls committed and committed, passes, goal shots, corner kicks etc. Taken together, these elements reveal which players are informal leaders within the team, which peers are under greater peer pressure, which opponents focus, which are underused, which partnerships work best, which sector needs to be restructured, and how to disrupt the team. rival.
An example of good insight to the coach who sees a network analysis of his team is that the presence of several informal leaders on the field, in addition to the team captain's formality, increases the chances of winning, as decentralization of play distributes better the match and gives no room for the opponent to play.
Benefits
By unraveling the role of each player on the field and how it articulates with the others, we know the influence of each piece on the board, what are the strengths and weaknesses of the team itself and the competitors. This information is critical for coaches to design appropriate tactical schemes for the squad. Similarly, business leaders are able to design team management and business strategies that are geared to improving results. In the field, the suitability is through passes, plays, goal. In companies, by the flow of ideas, knowledge and motivation.
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