Ambitious young players no longer have to wait for human scouts to watch them play to be noticed
Earlier this year, on a sweaty summer evening in Lisbon, Benfica hosted Burnley in a pre-season friendly. It wasn't a big deal for either club, but it was a special night for a young player named Jez Davies. At the age of 19, Davies made his first-team debut at Burnley, coming on as an 81st-minute substitute.
The teenager's introduction to the game was a significant moment for more than just him and his family. Few people in the stadium knew it, but it was also a big day for artificial intelligence (AI) and its growing influence on professional football.
Davis would not have appeared in Portugal wearing a Burnley shirt if it were not for modern technology. He had been sacked by Tottenham Hotspur a few months earlier and his future in the game seemed uncertain. He was noticed by artificial intelligence, which revived his football career and set him on the path to a professional contract with Burnley.
How? Following his release from Spurs, Davies uploaded a video of himself performing a series of exercises on an app called aiScout. The platform was developed by technology company ai.io and uses computer vision and deep learning engines to evaluate a player's movements and technical skills based on videos captured on a mobile phone. Tests include dribbling around cones, kicking and physical exercises such as shuttle sprints.
His stats were so impressive that Davies caught the attention of Burnley, who partner with aiScout (as do Chelsea) . From there he was offered a trial. Soon after, he was given a permanent contract.
Jez Davies had artificial intelligence to thank for his move to Burnley Credit: Kevin Hayden Photography
For the data scientists and techies behind aiScout, the story is seen as proof that their platform works. Meanwhile, for the rest of the football world, it's another sign of what's possible at scale as AI begins to change the industry in the same way it is changing so many others.
Ai.io are not the only ones using AI in football. Just this week, former Manchester United executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward was appointed as a strategic advisor and non-executive board member of Sentient Sports, another artificial intelligence company specializing in football.
When it comes to recruiting and recruiting, AI is starting to provide huge opportunities for clubs and players. The idea behind aiScout is that anyone with access to a smartphone can download the free app, upload their training videos, and send them to professional clubs and organizations.
It's data-driven remote scouting at scale , which would never have been possible with human eyes alone. If the player's results in the application meet the requirements set by, for example, Chelsea, then he will be invited to the test.
Chelsea FC trials have already begun. LIVE!
Watch this video to find out how to enter.@ChelseaFC pic.twitter.com/zoI9It32aH
— aiScout (@aiscout_app) October 24, 2023 Will people be pushed aside? The fear, as is often the case with AI, is that the technology will eliminate the need for human intelligence officers. From ai.io's point of view, there is no danger in this. After all, physical and technical training can tell a lot about a young player.
“The beauty of football is that it is multifaceted,” says Richard Felton-Thomas, director of ai.io. sports science. “You still need that human element. You want the person to ask, “What if he loses 3-0?” How does he communicate with his teammates? How does he cope with the trainer yelling at him?
“The human book completes the process. The first part comes from the individual: the club says, “These are the kind of players we need to find.” The AI then goes out to find that player by tracking the data. Then a person needs to watch these players. AI is in the middle.”
So far, more than 100 young people on the platform have either been invited to trials or signed up by professional clubs. That number is expected to grow rapidly next year following the launch of a partnership with Major League Soccer (MLS). MLS, MLS NEXT Pro (reserve league) and MLS NEXT (youth league) clubs will have access to this technology.
This is where AI and its impact on football player recruitment becomes truly intriguing. In a country like the United States, where soccer competes with sports such as American football, basketball and baseball, this technology can uncover talent that would otherwise never be found.
“A lot of kids play soccer, but they're actually on the basketball or soccer teams,” Felton-Thomas says. “They only play football on the side, but they can be talented. These players will never be tracked down [through traditional methods] because they are not registered. It was phenomenal for us to find such unregistered players.”
The opportunity is too great to fully comprehend
AI-powered intelligence effectively removes all the usual infrastructure and cost barriers (except the cost of a smartphone). For example, a talented Chicago sportsman will no longer need to join the right soccer team and play in the right soccer league to be noticed by a scout. If their performance in the application is good enough, that's where they'll go.
The possibilities here are too great to be fully grasped. When the prestigious Reliance Foundation football academy in India used aiScout to scout players during the pandemic, the app had over 7,000 participants. The top 400 players were invited to face-to-face trials, and four of the 19 who were eventually selected had never played organized football before. Without AI, these four would never have been noticed. No one in the sport would ever know of their existence.
aiScout helps players find clubs using a free app
No there is no reason to limit the use of this technology to football. This is the starting point for now. But, for example, this type of AI will soon be able to tell a young basketball player that his physical characteristics are well suited for football. Or, based on his data, he might suggest to a cricketer that baseball might be his best sport.
It may be some time before teenagers in the poorest communities of, say, South America start using mobile apps to put yourself in front of elite scouts. But it is a natural extension of the technology that is already beginning to influence football in this country. Artificial intelligence is changing the world, and football, as the largest sport on the planet, is certainly not immune to this.
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