“Data analytics was a big step,” Jan Wendt tells Sky Sports. “This is a huge leap in the evolution of football data.” Wendt is co-founder of Plaier, a company that helps to bring artificial intelligence technology in Premier League football.
They already work with four Premier League clubs and 10 times that number worldwide. By harvesting enormous data and using AI to understand it, they offer guidance on transfers, squadroncohesia and whether it's time to dismiss the coach.
The first plan of Wendt and his business partner was to use AI as a prediction tool, but they soon realized that measuring football is the most important challenge for decision makers within the game. “That is just as important to make better decisions.”
After built what they claim to be the largest database ever built in football – “an exotic mesh of event data, injury data and salary data about more than 100 competitions” – they work together with everyone from owners to data analysts to the game help change.
“We look at it in three steps. One, we can tell you exactly how strong your team is and how strong you need to achieve your goals. Two, we can get the expected impact of each player on the purpose of you Team tell a difference at the end of the season.
“We offer a very clear insight, so that you know exactly which positions you need to focus to get stronger. The third part is helping clubs to find the right players, to invest the money in the best possible way. It's better Insight to make better decisions, basically.
'Imagine that you are a doctor and that you have to make a diagnosis without an X -ray. You know that the leg hurts, but you can only touch it with your hands to see if it is broken or just bruised. Or someone has lung problems, but you can only listen to them.
“Then comes a man with an X -ray. It does not mean that the decisions in the past were wrong, it just gives you an extra level of insight into what is happening. We offer an extra tool. It gives an owner a very transparent view On what happens in their club.
“If you want to reach Europe, these are your competitors and this is how strong they are. Do you want to perform better? From how to get to the next level.”
Although all clubs have access to the same data via Plaier, how they use it differs. Some are also willing to use it as a filter to better aim their scouts, while others are more careful and prefer to have a feeling control there at their signing sessions.
“They make a list of players that they like, we make a list of players who recommend our system and we see if there is an overlap. That is how the more careful clubs work. The more advanced way is to really use it To find recommendations to find recommendations. “
Surprise Kane -Prepaid
What have the lessons learned? “Defensive positions are cheaper than attacking positions.” Maybe no surprise there. But the consequences of acquiring that expensive new striker can be complex. There is more going on than the goals they score.
Some insights can shock. For example, when Harry Kane signed for Bayern Munich, Plaier pulled the headlines in Germany when it was revealed that their models predicted that Bundesliga's record recording would not have a positive effect on the team.
“Eventually they had a goal difference of 54 without him and 49 with him,” says Wendt. Bayern's lowest for 13 years. “Tottenham also got better, won more points, scored more goals and had a better goal difference. That is how we simulated it.”
It is not a light on Kane, only a recognition that football is a team sport with many moving parts. Add something to a team and you can lose something elsewhere. “The first season with Erling Haaland also scored fewer goals,” adds Wendt.
Calculating the impact of individual players is extremely useful for clubs in making decisions about recruitment and retention. “This is the most used tool.” With a click on the button, the likely consequence of replacing one player can be shown through the other.
“Data of events have been around for 15 years or more. What we want to measure is system efficiency, not how they can dribble or how fast they are. How does the player contribute to the success of a team? That's what we have To train.
“That is the only thing that counts, because this is a team sport with many dependencies and correlations. What the AI does is like a helicopter, an overview is needed. Then the patterns try to find in these billions of correlations. There is so much data. what is important?
“If we proposed a player to become a member of Manchester City, we would simulate 38 games 100,000 times against each Premier League team to see how that works. You can't handle that data manually, it would kill a computer. You have Artificial intelligence needed. “
Continue with Manchester City, he makes his point. “For example, Ederson or Stefan Ortega? The score is almost the same.” But then he removes Rodri from the city side. “It has a huge impact.” And this would be long before his injury was marked.
“A player like Rodri is in the 7000 range on our metric. There are perhaps 200 or so players in the world about the 6000 level, so there is a risk to have a player so good. It is very difficult to You could replace Roger in your Davis Cup team “
Coach Impact overrays
In contrast to Wendt's vision on the significant impact of world -class players, the impact of coaches is something that he regards as overwhelmed. He did not come in with in advance ideas. It was a finding. “This was a bit surprising for us,” he admits.
“One of AI's more interesting lessons is that the quality of the player is responsible for around 90 percent of the sporting success and the coach's contribution is only about 10 percent. Do not forget that 10 percent can still make the difference.
“But coaches tend to convince a team with a team for a maximum of a year. No coach in our system in the last 10 years has long been too many goods, with a few exceptions.” Who are they? “Christian Streich in Freiburg and Pep Guardiola in Manchester City.”
Guardiola's recent struggles – without Rodri, of course only serve to emphasize the point. It can also work the other way. The models also suggested, in contrast to the popular opinion, that Jurgen Klopp did not overpack wild in Liverpool.
Wendt shows a graph with Klopp directly on the line where the results can be expected for a team of that quality. “You can see that Jurgen is here, directly on the Groene Lijn, as it was in the previous season.” That line represents performance in line with expectations.
Again, it is not to discredit Klopp. Part of the reason why these players are appreciated so high is because Klopp improved them. “Jurgen has of course contributed to it. And it is not that Arne Slot does not earn a credit either. But it is a very strong team,” says Wendt.
“At the moment I think our models show that Liverpool has the strongest team in Europe, perhaps the second strongest team. If a new coach comes in with new motivation, and he is able to add two percent than the results can be amazing from that. “
The temptation to change coach will only grow now that the transfer window is closed. “It's the only real thing you can change now. It's like an orphan greeting Mary -pass in football.” But because of the insights of Plaier, the hope is that better decisions will be made.
“Owners always have that problem, is my team not good enough or does it not get the coach the best performance from the team? Thomas Tuchel at Chelsea, for example. That was not necessary. He actually performed as good as the team.”
Wendt talks about “training the market” and “offering a more precise basis for decisions” in an industry that can still be led by emotion and gut feeling. It is suspected that this can only be the beginning, because Plaier intends to expand his reach.
“We now have a few psychological parameters. We can predict injuries. It is an extraordinary tool and we add things every few weeks, but in a careful way because there is already too much. If we all put it in, people would do it too too too too too find it hard to serve. “
It seems that football is becoming more complicated. Ironically, the purpose of all this is to make decisions easier. “We want to make it black and white for the club. This player is good enough to make you better or not. Simple if that.” Welcome to the world of AI.
Comments