The genesis of data-driven decision-making in the world of soccer tactics : deciphering the potential of big data

2021

Master's thesis in Information systems (IS501) Arguably, soccer is a more fluid sport than other popular sports such as baseball, American football, and cricket, which explicitly require more discrete ‘plays.’ Moreover, with twenty-two players always committed, it has more moving elements than basketball or ice hockey. From a mathematical perspective, this signifies that soccer has more degrees of freedom than these other sports, making it difficult to evaluate the game using one or a small number of metrics. Over time, this challenge has been made exceedingly more difficult within the soccer community. The availability of data has increased much more rapidly than the scientific advancement…