What is Football Movement Analysis?
PinnedIt started with a question from Paul Balsom, Performance Manager for the Swedish National Men’s football team: “Can we figure out which parameter best describes ‘short, sharp dynamic’ activity in football and how it is sensitive to drill type, player, movement etc.?”
Enter Football Movement Analysis
Created through a collaboration between industry experts and Catapult’s in-house Data Scientists, Catapult’s new Football Movement Analysis uses data from the inertial sensors, within the Vector technology suite, to create a tool capable of monitoring and reporting mechanical aspects of football specific movements.
Using only inertial sensors, Football Movement Analysis defines movement in six categories:
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Very Low Intensity: standing like movements
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Low Intensity: walking like movements
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Running Medium Intensity: steady state jogging-running like movements
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Running High Intensity: steady state high speed running like movements
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Dynamic Medium Intensity: medium intensity turning, change of direction and accel/decel like movements
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Dynamic High Intensity: high intensity short sharp turning, change of direction and accel/decel like movements
Each category is measured by absolute duration (time) and relative duration (% of time), continually over the entire duration of the activity.
“The clip above highlights an individual passage of play, defined by many short-sharp movements, which traditional positional derived metrics fail to factor into athlete work profiles.
During this passage of play, we are able to see the Football Movement Analysis classifying the player’s movements, including these ‘traditionally missing’ elements of the game in the overall movement profile.
With Football Movement Analysis we are including these ‘traditionally missing’ elements of the game in the overall movement profile adding a new layer of insight into the physical demands of football, in addition to and complimentary of traditional locomotive profiles and event based counts..”
Typical player match Football Movement Analysis profile – Although there is equivalent time spent in ‘dynamic’ activity and ‘running’ activity, 8% of the total time is spent performing high intensity dynamic work, whereas only 2% performing high intensity running work, telling us that the majority of high intensity movements in game are not a result of linear running-based work.
How to use Football Movement Analysis
Football Movement Analysis can be used to establish normative profiles of mechanical load for athletes and drills which can then be used for comparison between matches and training sessions. This data can help further quantify a typical weekly training profile that can be used to influence global and individual periodisation strategies.
One of the unique features of Football Movement Analysis is that is can be used indoors to gather insightful information on mechanical load without the use of GPS. This allows drills preformed in indoor and outdoor environments to easily be analyzed and compared.
Furthermore, Total Dynamic Load can be used as a marker of the total volume of mechanical work preformed by an athlete which can help shape and quantify recovery protocols.
Summary
Football Movement Analysis delivers a brand new layer to load monitoring in football, providing a comprehensive breakdown of how the player is moving on the pitch (and at what intensity), and compliments many of the traditionally used GPS metrics available.
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