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Digital Planet: Data-driven football

Factual: Science & Nature

Futuristic silver soccer ball exploding into pixels

31/05/2022 GMT

Data-driven football

BBC World Service - Digital Planet, Data-driven football

Data-driven football; the tech behind the ABBAtars; cultural representation in video games

Data-Driven football
With the end of this year’s Premier League season and the Champion’s League final in the last two weekends, viewers around the world were cheering on their favourite teams. While the rules of football may not have changed much in recent years, there is one thing that has: the amount of data. Coaches and teams can now examine player performance and statistics in great detail. Has this transformed the way the game is played? Gareth chats to Ruben Saavedra, CEO of Metrica Sports, which uses software to analyse videos of football games, and we hear from John Muller, a sports journalist at The Athletic, and Jordi Mompart, Director of Research and Analytics at FC Barcelona. 

The tech behind the ABBAtars
ABBA's show opened this week in London, using digitally created avatars of their younger selves. Ghislaine tells Gareth about the cutting-edge tech that makes this performance possible and where else it might be used in the future.

Cultural representation in video games
Video games are a booming industry that is making its way across the globe. But are different cultures and places actually represented in mainstream games? BBC Arabic reporter Hossam Fazulla chats to Gareth about Jordanian games company Tamatem, which localises games for Arab audiences. And we speak to game developer Dimas Novan from Mojiken Productions in Indonesia, about their upcoming title 'A Space for the Unbound' and making content rooted in local culture.


The programme is presented by Gareth Mitchell with expert commentary from Ghislaine Boddington.

Studio Manager: Giles Aspen
Producer: Florian Bohr and Hannah Fisher

(Photo: Futuristic silver soccer ball exploding into pixels
Credit: Colin Anderson Productions pty Ltd/Getty Images)

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