Performance analysis, is it drowning in raw useless data?

At elite sports level sports performance data is an extremely valuable commodity and one that very often generates huge amounts of revenue for organisations such as OPTA and Prozone. It is also seen by many managers, coaches and athletes as extremely valuable in improving performance. As technology continues to advance at alarming rates there seems to be no end to the increasing ease to which we can acquire raw performance data. Having said that, there is a problem with this, raw data is useless. Furthermore, the vast volume of sport related data is starting to mirror what the business world call ‘big data’ and therefore it is starting to require more and more sophisticated tools and exceptionally skilled personnel to mine it into meaningful information. The next issue will inevitably be whether these tools and in particular the skilled people using them have the knowledge to verify and contextualise the information to continue to provide managers, coaches and athletes with the competitive edge it promises. I personally believe significant issues exist with information management in sport, even to go as far as to suggest the world of elite sport is starting to go off course in so much as the management of performance data may not be appreciated in the context of establishing a ‘target audience’.

We as analysts collect data and are expected to create meaningful information for everyone exposed to it. A recent tweet by @CPAUWIC took me to an article on data visualisation and how we are all often fooled by ‘sexy’ dashboards presenting data that may be of no real use. The fact remains data cannot be understood until it analysed, once the analysis process commences it starts to combine pieces of raw data that start to tell a story giving birth to new information. The visualisation and presentation of this information will have a major bearing on understanding it, remember, it is this information that a manager, coach and athlete will hopefully understand in a way that helps them improve sporting performance. As already suggested the volume of the data being acquired is in some cases astonishing and as a consequence this plants seeds too many questions, two of mine would be, do we really understand the value of some of this data? And who is it valuable to? Reflecting on these questions I tend to ask myself further questions, at what point will our athletes start playing the data rather the sport itself? Are we already seeing the effects of athletes being more concerned about the data than the sport?

A word that consistently seems to crop up during pre-match and post-match interviews is ‘balance’, (“getting the balance right”). The same can be said of data, have we got the balance right? Are we providing athletes with too much data and information? I ask myself if one does not have the knowledge to comprehend or react effectively to the data and information then what is the value in providing it to that person. For example, if an athlete runs 5.9 miles during a match yet has no knowledge of conditioning then how does the athlete knowing this help him/her? If the measure of success during a match is the team that run the most miles win, then yes, there is value in presenting this data in such a raw context, although the fact remains, most field based sport is usually about scoring more points than your opponent. So how do we create value in such data so athletes resist the urge to concentrate on improving specific elements of the data during their performance to the detriment of the overall performance?

It’s seems to be in the human psyche to want to know everything which means data management, mining data and finding ways for the data to work for you is a growing challenge facing sport. Manchester City recently displayed through the release of MCFC analytics that they feel the best way to get value from their data is to give it away. Are they drowning in their own data? Is this truly part of an open data policy? Or is it simply a way to see if anyone out there can create more meaningful information with the data than they currently can? When I first looked at this data I was amazed, In fact, there was so much data it was a little intimidating, where would you even start to produce meaningful information. I then considered the fact this was the small data file and that too much information affects our ability to make decisions and progress forward. I could only imagine how it is so easy to be overwhelmed and paralysed by the vast volume of data.

Sport has never been or will ever be a science. Athletes, coaches and managers were never meant to be scientist, therefore, in my opinion those that develop a balanced information management system that identifies the value of specific performance data and filter such data to the correct targeted audience will be the ones that gain the most competitive advantage from performance analysis as it continues to evolve. When I consider some of the demands on the modern athlete a quote by Idreis Shah comes to mind “People today are in danger of drowning in information; but, because they have been taught that information is useful, they are more willing to drown than they need be. If they could handle information, they would not have to drown at all.”

As someone that dedicates the majority of my time applying video based performance analysis at the grass roots and intermediate levels of sport I see many benefits of introducing performance analysis into your coaching process. I constantly ask myself can the grass roots and development levels of sport afford to ignore performance analysis altogether? Every time I conclude no. I think of the mass volume of data and information produced and circulated and the knock on effect it is having on the grass roots and development levels of sport. Many people see all these ‘sexy’ dashboards, analysis blogs and media printed performance reports and are simply afraid of introducing what seems to be a very complex process into their coaching. The pace at which the grass roots and intermediate levels of sport take up analysis techniques will depend on how quickly we can convince the sceptics that there are benefits and that you don’t have to be an IT genius to introduce performance analysis into your coaching process.

The good news is that ‘infobesity’ can be dealt with and that doesn’t require taking the extreme measure of not embedding performance analysis into your coaching process at all. It just takes you to really establish what’s important and what’s not. Start by creating a list of everything you want to know about your athlete’s performance. Outcomes of passes, tackles, shots, distances, runs, positioning etc. really go for it and make the most extensive list you can. Now for the important bit, the culling of data, define what matters to you, how important is each data type to your playing philosophy, eliminate all those that come low on your list of importance. Now start to capture some data, analyse it and monitor its value, are you getting a performance edge from acquiring it? If something isn’t providing you with an edge or improvement, delete it from the process. If you keep collecting it and you are getting no value from it you will still feel obligated to look at it, this could affect your ability to make decisions. Only provide the information to those that can comprehend it and gain value from it, think of what your different specialist coaches need, your S&C coach, your medical staff and your athletes, remember, less is more. I leave you with a quote from Herbert Simon “What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it”