The Potential of Wearable Technology in Amateur Football. A qualitative study
©2017
Textbook
57 Pages
Summary
This book provides a comparison of different wearable technology systems used in professional football. Furthermore, it includes a qualitative study about the possibilites of amateur football clubs to use said devices or similar ones and to see if it makes sense to use wearable technology in amateur football.
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
List of Tables
Table 1: Technical aspects of the three wearable devices ... 29
Table 2: Measured metrics from the three wearable devices ... 30
Table 3: Wearing comfort and usability of the Withings Pulse sensor ... 37
Table 4: Performance motivation by using the Withings Pulse sensor ... 37
Table 5: Wearing comfort and usability of the Samsung Gear Live smartwatch ... 38
Table 6: Performance motivation by using the Samsung Gear Live smartwatch ... 39
IV
1
Introduction
July 13th, Rio de Janeiro, Maracanã Stadium. The 118
th
minute of the World Cup Final
between Germany and Argentina, when substitute Mario Götze scored the winner for the
German team and achieved that the 24-year World Cup wait came to an end. From a fan
perspective, the choice to substitute Mario Götze and not Lukas Podolski or maybe Julian
Draxler seemed to be some mix of a good feeling by the coach and pure luck, but this sub-
stitution was based on much more than just gut instincts or a lucky thought. Head coach
Joachim "Jogi" Löw and his coaching staff were using a wearable technology called "adid-
as miCoach Elite System" thanks to which they were able to find out that Mario Götze was
the roster´s best overall player in playing and keeping the ball within short time and room
on the pitch. According to the collected and evaluated data of the five-a-side football train-
ing units, Mario Götze provided the skills needed to win this game (Soper, 2015). However
not only the German national team, also almost every other national team at this world
cup, were using different kinds and brands of wearable technology during their training
sessions to gather real time data from their players, which the staff could analyze to pro-
vide the coaching staff with an overview over specific strength and weaknesses of individ-
ual players in various situations which can occur on the pitch and to adjust the training
sessions to improve how the staff wants each player to improve individually. (González,
2014) Apart from the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, almost every football club in the top Eu-
ropean leagues and every Major League Soccer (MLS) franchise is using wearable tech-
nology for 3 to 4 years now, but this method of improvement in training session is nothing
new in the world of sports, especially in the USA. Most football teams of the National
Football League (NFL) are using wearable technology for years now in training and
workout sessions as well as in league games to analyze the performances of their athletes
and contribute with that to take the sport to a higher level every season (Johnson, 2015),
(Neal, 2013).
While several wearable technologies made a huge impact on the training sessions of pro-
fessional football clubs in the last years and are now a must have for every team which
wants to keep up with the world elite, nearly no amateur football club is using this kind of
technology in their weekly routine of training session. This thesis is going to examine the
potential of wearable technologies in amateur football and will give answer to the follow-
1
ing questions: How easy can wearable technology be used and is it a suitable method for
amateur clubs in terms of functionality and usability as well as affordability.
Introduction
All the above stated questions will be answered in this thesis to provide an evaluation con-
cerning the potential of wearable technology in amateur football.
2
2
US sports as pioneers in using wearable technology
Before the use of different products of wearable technology in professional football and the
potential for it to be used in amateur football will be discussed, there will be a short out-
look to the United States of America, where the use of wearable technology is almost
standard in training sessions as well in competitive games.
As described earlier, wearable technology is nothing new in US sports, especially in the
big leagues outside of football like the National Football League (NFL), National Hockey
League (NHL) and the Major Baseball League (MLB). The NFL teams are using a wide
range of wearable technology for a long time now for many different functions. In 2013
Microsoft signed a contract with the NFL to provide all the teams with their Microsoft Pro
tablet. This tablet is used on the sideline of a NFL game to be used by players and coaches
to make it much easier for coaches to show their players which play from the team´s play-
book is going to be called next and which routes for each player will be chosen.
However, there are also technologies which are literally wearable and are used in training
and also in games. Companies like Google or Oculus produced virtual reality headsets for
team training in the NFL. These virtual reality headsets provide each player with a 360-
degree camera to simulate specific in game situations and to work on them much more
efficient. First used by the Dallas Cowboys, now a lot other NFL teams like the New York
Jets and the Arizona Cardinals are using them to bring their training sessions to a higher
und much more professional level. Also GoPro cameras are technologies that are being
used by NFL teams, for example the New York Giants with their star player Odell Beck-
ham Jr. This feature makes it easier for coaches to analyze the movements of their players
and to give them individual advice to perform better in various situations. It also brings a
positive side effect for fans to watch the actions of their favorite players from a point of
view perspective. The NFL is also a forerunner in using wearable technology in real
games, not just in training sessions. Apart from the Microsoft Surface tablets, which are
not worn on the body by players, the NFL allowed the players to wear shoulder pad sen-
sors for capturing live data like speed, body movements and GPS positions by the Illinois
based company Zebra Technologies. These stats are a massive help for the teams coaching
staff to quickly get individual information about their players and to adjust the playbook,
the training sessions and the tactics individually to get a higher chance of succeeding in
games. In 2015, for the first time the NFL allowed these chips to be inside the ball in a
3
US sports as pioneers in using wearable technology
game to make it easier for the referees to spot the exact position of the ball after close plays
and to measure the throwing speed (Plummer, 2016).
All these examples show that sport in the US, especially the NFL, is highly technological
supported since some time now, even in league games, which is not applicable for football
(Svetlik, 2015). However also the football teams kept up with the time, even if it took them
a little bit, but they slowly recognized the advantages of bringing more and more wearable
technologies into their training sessions.
4
3
Use of wearable technology in professional football
As described in Chapter 2, wearable technologies slowly made their way into football after
being a success in other sports like American football, shown by the use of it by NFL
teams. There are three big companies that made themselves a name in the market of wear-
able technology for football teams. adidas, STATSports and Catapult Sports. These three
companies provide mostly every top team all over the world with their specifically devel-
oped wearable performance tracking systems. The components, functionality and which
professional team uses which product will be exemplified in Chapter 3.
3.1
adidas miCoach Elite Team System
The probably best known product on the market for wearable technology in football, due to
the worldwide popularity of the company, is the "adidas miCoach Elite Team System".
This system, developed from 2010 to 2012 (MLS Communications, 2012) by German
sportswear manufacturer adidas, provides the coaching stuff in training sessions with indi-
vidual real time data from their players like speed, covered distance, heart rate, perfor-
mance or acceleration. With the help of this data the coaching staff is able to identify the
strengths and the weaknesses of every player so that they can efficiently impove training
sessions and develop individual workout plans for players in order to increase their per-
formance on the pitch.
3.1.1 Components and functionality
The system consists of five different components which are the "miCoach Elite Play-
er_Cell", the "Techfit Elite Shirt", the "miCoach Elite Base", the "miCoach Elite Dash-
board" and the "miCoach Elite Website" (Brüggen, Hübner, & Nationalmannschaft, 2014).
5
Use of wearable technology in professional football
Figure 1: Components of the adidas miCoach Elite System
(Donath, 2012)
The "miCoach Elite Player_Cell" is a wearable sensor, which measures the real time data
and transmits them via radio frequency to the "miCoach Elite Base". The sensor itself
weighs only about 52 grams and fits in between the shoulder blades of the "Techfit Elite
Shirt", which is a sleeveless compression shirt worn by the players. (Nosowitz, 2012) The
battery of the cell lasts about 8 hours, so there should be no problem to collect a huge
amount of data during long training sessions. (Vazquez, 2013) Apart from the included
"miCoach Elite Player_Cell", the "Techfit Elite Shirt" measures the heart rate with inbuilt
sensors while being comfortable to wear and it does not limit the movements of the play-
ers. The real time data from both the "miCoach Player_Cell" and the "Techfit Elite Shirt"
will be transmitted to the "miCoach Elite Base", which is a portable, robust and water re-
sistant receiver, placed on the side of the pitch. The "miCoach Elite Base" transfers the
data to the "miCoach Elite Dashboard", a tablet for the coaching staff, with which the
coaches are able to collect and analyze the individual real time data from each player.
Based on the collected data, they are able to create new training schedules and training
goals based on the data and to write summaries about recent training sessions. If the
"miCoach Elite Base" is connected to the internet, the device automatically transfers all the
data to the servers of the team to make it possible to review the data on the "miCoach Elite
Website". Also the intensity of the training session, the individual level of fitness and the
personal physical needs for each player will be displayed on the "miCoach Elite Website".
Aside from the intention to make the training sessions more efficient for each player indi-
6
Use of wearable technology in professional football
vidually and to increase the performances, the "adidas miCoach Elite System" also con-
tributes to the early prevention of possible injuries because the system captures the indi-
vidual impact that every session had on a player, thus coaches can regulate the training
intensity for some of them to prevent their bodies from getting injured and let them regen-
erate in the best possible way (Brüggen et al., 2014). The "adidas miCoach Elite System"
was successfully launched on field during the 2012 "AT&T MLS All-Star Game" on July
25
th
in Philadelphia and was set to be part of every teams training sessions with the start of
the 2013 season of the MLS (MLS Communications, 2012).
The "adidas miCoach" System also exists in a kind of "light version" for amateur athletes.
In their online shop, the company sells the "adidas miCoach Smart Ball" and their "adidas
miCoach X_Cell".
Figure 2: adidas miCoach Smart Ball and X_Cell
(adidas, 2016)
The "adidas miCoach Smart Ball" is a size five football with an integrated sensor which
transmits data like speed, spin and flight path of the ball directly via Bluetooth to the
"miCoach smart ball app" on the users Apple iPhone. The app allows the user to receive
this information about his strike and provides feedback, tutorials and coaching tips how to
perform bend, knuckle and power balls. The app also makes it possible to record the strikes
of the user to help honing the technique and the skill set of the user. Another side feature is
the possibility to share and compare the received stats with other users. adidas promises a
battery life of about 2000 kicks per week with a charging time of only one hour, which
makes it easy for the user to use the ball as often as possible (adidas, 2016).
7
Use of wearable technology in professional football
The "adidas miCoach X_Cell" is a portable sensor which the user can strap around his
body with an included textile strap. The function of this sensor is to measure the explo-
siveness of the user by collecting data about the quickness, reaction speed, intensity of
play, jump height and heart rate and transmitting them via Bluetooth to the "miCoach" app
on a smartphone. Referring to the collected data, the app provides the user with individual
training cardio plans to improve endurance and quickness and also strength and flexibility
plans to develop the users lower and upper body power. Another optional training plan are
drills to improve jump height. Because the "adidas miCoach X_Cell" stores up to seven
hours of workout data, the user is not forced to keep his smartphone while working out
with the sensor (adidas, 2016).
3.1.2 Professional use
3.1.2.1 German national team
As mentioned in the Introduction, the German national team started using "adidas
miCoach" at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil in their training sessions during the tournament
and obviously the use of this system was a big success because the team won the World
Cup in the final against Argentina after substitute Mario Götze scored the game winning
goal seven minutes before the end of overtime (Brüggen et al., 2014). As also earlier de-
scribed, the decision to substitute Mario Götze instead of another player was also relying
on Mario Götze´s evaluated data in playing five against five, that was the best overall of
the squad, in training sessions where it is important to keep control of the ball in a small
space, to make quick decisions with little time, which was perfect for the situation in the
final going into overtime (Soper, 2015). According to Darcy Norman, the director of EX-
OS, a performance innovation company that partners with adidas and the German national
team, the adidas miCoach system was used almost in every training session during the
tournament to track and evaluate the performance of individual players of the German
squad (Hymers, 2014). One of the key metrics, as reported by Norman, was analyzing the
efficiency and fitness of players by tracking their production of power relative to their loss
of energy during training sessions (Hymers, 2014). Another important aspect the team ana-
lyzed by using the miCoach system was the individual movement of players on the pitch in
relation to their certain position. Referring to this data, the coaching team was able to set
goals for each player, or a group of players with the same position on the pitch, which they
had to achieve. Based on setting these specific goals for training sessions and position
drills, the German national team created game plans for the upcoming match in the tour-
8
Use of wearable technology in professional football
nament and set up specially prepared training sessions in order to achieve the goals of the
game plan (Hymers, 2014).
3.1.2.2 MLS teams
In the US-American Major League Soccer, the adidas miCoach system was standardized
launched in 2013 to be used by all league teams during training sessions to gather individ-
ual player data and enhance team performance by using it. MLS franchise Portland Tim-
bers noticed the value of evaluated data by the miCoach system some time earlier at the
2012 MLS Combine in Florida, when potential draft picks
1
showcase their talents in a pro-
cess of several drill sessions. Some of these eligible players were outfitted with a miCoach
sensor, including defender Andrew Jean-Baptiste, who eventually has been drafted by the
Portland Timbers, after impressing them because of his outstanding measurements during a
sprint session tracked with the miCoach system (Costello, 2012). Apart from relying on the
adidas miCoach system during the MLS Combine, the franchise is also using the system
during their training sessions but according to assistant coach Amos Magee, the coaching
staff will not focus 100% on the evaluated data from the miCoach system and will still rely
on their personal evaluation of players and their performance during a training session
(Costello, 2012). He expressed himself on the homepage of the Portland Timbers:
"For example, just because a guy is covering a lot of ground, that doesn't necessarily
mean it's smart running or that he's in the right place at the right time. That's a statistic
that needs to come with experience. So some of these measurements are going to be useful,
but some aren't. We'll just have to see which ones fill a void." (Costello, 2012)
Besides from the German national team and all the MLS franchises, several other profes-
sional football teams started adopting the miCoach system, among them Chelsea FC, one
of the most popular football clubs in the world, five-time Premier League winner and
Champions League winner in 2012 (Neal, 2013).
3.2
STATSports Viper System
Another well-known company on the market for wearable technology in sports, especially
in football is STATSports Technologies Ltd. STATSports is a British company, founded in
2008, made themselves a name for developing the so called "Viper System", which let the
company expand to places like Ireland, London, Chicago and Florida. The system includes
1
College football players who signed up for the "MLS SuperDraft" to be picked by a MLS franchise after
college
9
Use of wearable technology in professional football
components which all together form a system for football teams to track and rate the per-
formance of their players individually, similar to the "adidas miCoach Elite System".
Apart from football, the Viper System is also used in sports like American Football, Rug-
by, Basketball and Athletics, so you can say the range of the company´s various clients are
very wide. The Viper System combines both software and wearable tools to form a sophis-
ticated system to track a huge amount of data (STATSports, 2016).
3.2.1 Components and functionality
The flagship product of the Viper System and the so called "world's leading performance
monitoring tool for elite sports teams on the market" (STATSports, 2016) is the ,,Viper
Pod".
Figure 3: STATSports Viper Pod
(STATSports, 2016)
The "Viper Pod" is a high functional wearable sensor that streams live performance data in
real time via the Viper Live Streaming software to be analyzed promptly or to log the data
for post session download. The award winning unit stands out because of its ergonomically
design, light weight (less than 50 grams) but nevertheless its high functionality including
four processors, 3-D accelerometer, gyroscope and digital compass, an inbuilt heart rate
receiver, a GPS module and its high streaming performance at a rate from 50 Hz (live
streaming) to 100Hz (logging data). The inbuilt heart rate receiver is able to track both
10
Use of wearable technology in professional football
heart rate variability and heart rate exertion from a range up to 240 beats per minute, so
coaches can control the intensity of every training session for individually selected players.
The Viper Pod unit is designed to fit in between the shoulder blade of players who have the
choice of wearing a Viper Vest or a Viper Base Layer with or without sleeves.
(STATSports, 2016)
Figure 4: STATSports Base Layer and Vest
(STATSports, 2016)
Both of these products, the vest and the base layer are tight fitted and designed to always
have a perfect GPS signal. In addition, the base layer contains an extra integrated pocket
for the heart rate monitor so the player can wear it without a strap for better comfort. Other
elementary components of the Viper System are the Viper Dock, the mobile antenna and
the Training Ground Screen System. The Viper Dock is available with four or with twelve
docking stations. The function is to download the data from the Viper Pods and to transfer
them via USB to the STATSports software on the connected laptop where the coaches can
evaluate them. The mobile antenna is sort of the "counterpart" to the Viper Docks, if a
team decides to stream their training sessions in real time they are able to do this involving
up to 30 players with the antenna. The advantages of streaming a training session live are
that the coaching staff is able to intervene directly if they recognize something odd or un-
satisfactorily during the session. By this time, several Premier League clubs have decided
to install fixed antennas of the Viper system to their training ground, it is called the
"STATSports VSI Smart Training Ground System" (STATSports, 2016).
11
Details
- Pages
- Type of Edition
- Erstausgabe
- Publication Year
- 2017
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9783960676270
- ISBN (Softcover)
- 9783960671275
- File size
- 15 MB
- Language
- English
- Institution / College
- Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg – Wirtschaftswissenschaften
- Publication date
- 2017 (March)
- Grade
- 2,0
- Keywords
- Fußball Qualitative Studie Amateur Soccer Professional Football Soccer adidas miCoach STATSports Viper Catapult Sports 1. FC Kalchreuth Case Study Samsung Gear Withings Pulse Adidas
- Product Safety
- Anchor Academic Publishing
