The Premier League season is a 10-month, 38-match grind for every footballer who participates – not to mention the League and FA cup, European games, pre-season and commercial tours. But the physical demands on each player are unique, as different positions, body types, injury histories, styles, strategies and time on the pitch exact a specific toll. Tracking those exigencies and predicting their short- and long-term effects is hard enough for performance practitioners when a professional club has full control of, and access to, a player. But when that player breaks away and plunges into international play? The degree of difficulty in monitoring and making sense of those factors skyrockets.
That’s why EPL clubs and practitioners often lament the moment of the football cycle in which they currently find themselves, coming off the every-four-years Euros and Copa America tournaments, and now in the early stage of the new Premier League season. With hundreds of players having disrupted their usual offseason routines to subject themselves to the additional and often divergent physical demands of international play, the circumstances dictate that there is much work for practitioners to do and even more uncertainty for them to white-knuckle through.
But what if technology could assist in this process? How useful are performance-tracking tools in helping to prevent injuries and optimize player performance after what amounts to the collective, league-wide shock to the system of international play?
The Fundamental Data Gap Between Pro and International Clubs
In a best-case scenario, the performance-tracking system utilized by a professional football club is also used by the national teams of every single roster player who participates in international play. For good measure, let’s say that each of those national clubs is willing to share that data. At least the pro club’s practitioners would be able to compare apples to apples, so to speak, and begin the work of determining player-by-player load management, movement and rehabilitation programs and restrictions based on comparable collected data.
But while they’re at it, those practitioners might as well wish upon a star and toss a coin into a fountain, because that best-case scenario is the stuff of fairy tales. Many national teams aren’t as well-funded as the typical Premier League club, and the likelihood of each of them employing the same performance-tracking equipment and sharing their findings is roughly nil. Practitioners for EPL and other pro clubs can expect to be left to their own devices (both literally and figuratively) when determining their players’ physical states and how best to account for them following international competition.
Preparing Players After International Play Using Advanced Tech
The likelihood of player fatigue and elevated injury risk after an offseason of international tournaments is high, and it’s up to team practitioners to determine how to account for it. But with advanced player-performance tracking such as that provided by Sportlight, clubs have an opportunity to measure players’ athletic baselines, monitor growth and the presence of weaknesses or imbalances, and structure training and rehab programs based on real-time capabilities and historical data that ensure player safety and optimal outcomes. A team that collects and analyzes this data over time can count on accurate and insightful athletic profiles of each of its players until the moment they step off the pitch and away for Euro or Copa competition.
The demands of international play are an additional burden for every player – jarringly different from those of a typical offseason – and, for some, the physical requirements can vary widely from those in their professional roles. But with an advanced tracking system and AI-driven insights such as those from Sportlight, a club can evaluate its players prior to international play – essentially determining baselines – which can help performance staff understand where their players are physically upon return.
Not even members of a monolith such as the EPL have the power to control all of their surroundings. But with the right tools, professional clubs have the ability to quickly assess and react to the hard-driving demands of international competition on their players, mitigating injury risk and preparing the athletes who wear their kits to perform at their best through the entirety of a professional season.
Comments