You know those jokes about nerds/geeks vs jocks. Movies made it seem like there is no place in the sports world for geeky talk. That’s not quite the case.
Today we talk about something that I know that you, dear sport hater, will love. There is some pretty cool tech that FIFA will be introducing this year. Yes, that same FIFA that’s responsible for those games you were raised on.
See, I dip my toes in both worlds and can confirm that some of my sport crazed friends couldn’t tell you what a Snapdragon is to save their lives. However, they still do appreciate watching their teams lose in Ultra HD.
A few beers and a lull in the action usually ends in someone marveling about how they are watching something happening thousands of kilometres away in real time. They love that.
What they have mixed feelings about is when tech enters the actual sports arena. Oh, they hate it. There have been a number of tech uses in football so far and only a few have been welcomed.
VAR
Video Assistant Referee (VAR) technology is probably the most hated of all. This tech is simple, it is just introducing some other referee who reviews video to identify any clear and obvious errors made by the on-field referee.
In practice, it takes too long for the video reviews, there doesn’t seem to be consistency in the decisions made etc.
I think that’s all misplaced anger though. What irks people is the removal of the ‘gray zone.’ We were so used to some erroneous decisions being made in tight situations. They made for good conversation.
There is a famous incident of one football legend scoring in an important World Cup match using his hand. Which is not allowed. That goal is now lovingly called ‘the hand of God’ and we love talking about it because our English friends who were knocked out thanks to it hate it so much.
Had VAR been available then, we would not have The Hand of God. As much as the English hate it, I don’t think even they would wish for a world without it. VAR is depriving us of any other such moments.
Semi-automated offside tech
Sports fans are not going to love this. One of the main issues with VAR has been its use in deciding whether a person was offside or not. Aside from inconsistencies in decisions made, it just sucks having goals disallowed simply because a striker’s toe was offside.
FIFA has been trialing out some tech to aid referees in making faster and more accurate offside decisions. This semi-automated offside tech is apparently ready for primetime and will be used at the upcoming World Cup later this year.
I realise some of my techie friends here may not be familiar with what ‘offside’ means. One is offside if they are nearer to an opponent’s goal line than both the ball and the second-last opponent.
So, with the previous system VAR used optical tracking to determine when the ball was kicked and where the player receiving it was.
That’s a fancy way of saying they just freeze-framed to determine when ball left foot and then drew lines to determine where receiving player was when that happened. They were limited to 50fps, what the video is captured at, when doing this.
The new system
The Adidas ball that will be used has a sensor in the middle which sends inertial data 500 times per second (500Hz). Giving a more accurate idea of where the ball is at any given time. This is much better than the 50fps video currently being used.
There will also be 12 dedicated cameras tracking that same ball as well as the players on the field. The cameras will track up to 29 data points on each of the 22 players on the field 50 times per second. All parts of the body of the body relevant to offside decisions are tracked. That’s a lot of data.
Source: FIFA
So this limb and ball tracking data is combined and artificial intelligence uses it to provide automated offside alerts. This happens in seconds and the referees only have to review the decision. Making for much faster and accurate decisions.
When reviewing the system’s decisions, referees will work with the calculated positional data points, not optical data like before. After they confirm that decision, the system generates a 3D animation that shows where players’ limbs where when the ball was played.
This video is then shown on big screens in the stadium and also on TVs across the world. That way everyone sees exactly what transpired.
Source: FIFA
What a system
We shall see how well the system works. There will be no room for technical challenges as it will be used on live games. Football fans have no patience for anything that stops the action for even a few seconds.
We are tired of celebrating goals, realising an offside check is underway, biting our nails for a while and then celebrating again when the goal is confirmed. The new system promises to cut that time but it better not malfunction, not even once.
FIFA says they have tried out the enhanced system in some tournaments and it has worked well. We shall be the judges of that at the biggest sporting event in world later this year.
So, my techie friend with no interest in sports, what do you think about this tech? You have to admit it’s impressive, not revolutionary, but still impressive.
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