Unlocking the potential of big data to support tactical performance analysis in professional soccer: A systematic review

In professional soccer, increasing amounts of data are collected that harness great potential when it comes to analysing tactical behaviour. Unlocking this potential is difficult as big data challenges the data management and analytics methods commonly employed in sports. By joining forces with comp...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:European journal of sport science 2021-04, Vol.21 (4), p.481-496
Main Authors: Goes, F.R., Meerhoff, L.A., Bueno, M.J.O., Rodrigues, D.M., Moura, F.A., Brink, M.S., Elferink-Gemser, M.T., Knobbe, A.J., Cunha, S.A., Torres, R.S., Lemmink, K.A.P.M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
big data
Football
performance analysis
tactical analysis
team sport
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Summary:In professional soccer, increasing amounts of data are collected that harness great potential when it comes to analysing tactical behaviour. Unlocking this potential is difficult as big data challenges the data management and analytics methods commonly employed in sports. By joining forces with computer science, solutions to these challenges could be achieved, helping sports science to find new insights, as is happening in other scientific domains. We aim to bring multiple domains together in the context of analysing tactical behaviour in soccer using position tracking data. A systematic literature search for studies employing position tracking data to study tactical behaviour in soccer was conducted in seven electronic databases, resulting in 2338 identified studies and finally the inclusion of 73 papers. Each domain clearly contributes to the analysis of tactical behaviour, albeit in - sometimes radically - different ways. Accordingly, we present a multidisciplinary framework where each domain's contributions to feature construction, modelling and interpretation can be situated. We discuss a set of key challenges concerning the data analytics process, specifically feature construction, spatial and temporal aggregation. Moreover, we discuss how these challenges could be resolved through multidisciplinary collaboration, which is pivotal in unlocking the potential of position tracking data in sports analytics.
ISSN:1746-1391
1536-7290
DOI:10.1080/17461391.2020.1747552