Leicester City’s Premier League triumph may have been branded one of the greatest achievements in sporting history but it has now emerged that it is the club’s use of advanced data analytics which has been a major factor in this success.
When it comes to the use of football data analytics, it has been claimed the club is one of the most advanced in the Premier League as the Foxes have been using a number of highly sophisticated tools, coupled with wearable technology, for years.
According to Chris Mann, marketing executive at Prozone Sports – which currently supplies technology to 19 of the 20 Premier League teams – Leicester City FC has been using its products for 10 of the past 11 seasons, although this season appears to have been when it all came together.
Mann explained: “Leicester currently receive a feed of our Prozone3 tracking data to support the enhanced assessment of player fitness and conditioning through a range of physical metrics, such as distance covered, sprints and high intensity runs.
“This type of data can be used to inform the coaching process and to tailor training programmes to the needs of individual players based on their in-game exertions.”
One of the key factors this season has been the relatively small number of injuries Leicester players suffered. By the end of April 2016, Leicester racked up fewer injuries than every club in the Premier League, according to Physioroom.com.
As a result, manager Claudio Ranieri could pick the same starting 11 for the majority of the season.
The club was able to combat any potential injury problems by using Prozone’s tools and wearable technology, such as Catapult Sports’ OptimEye S5. The OptimEye S5 is a small GNSS-based device that uses satellite reception and is worn at the top of the back.
This technology enabled the club to establish the risk of a player getting injured at any given time based on benchmark data that automatically shows when they have exceeded their usual workload.
Paul Boanas, head of Europe, the Middle East & Africa at Catapult, told ComputerWeekly: “It’s an integral part of their everyday loading of players. They use it to check whether a player is ready to either play or return from injury by looking at/comparing what they are capable of when fully fit. Most teams use the devices to manage the ‘load’ on players.
“We don’t claim to stop injuries, but we can help mitigate the risk of them and Leicester do this very well.”
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