Day 1
Host Opening Remarks
Predicting potential: Identifying the behaviours of an elite player
Richard Allen is currently Head of Talent ID at the Football Association where he is responsible for supporting National Coaches with their selection of English Qualified Players. He has also been pivotal in the development of an education pathway for those involved in Talent ID and Recruitment from grassroots to Technical Directors within the professional game. In 2018, Richard will be taking up a new role as Director of Football at Loughborough University. In this keynote, Richard will share his expertise in scouting the right talent.
Richard Allen
Formerly Head of Talent Identification
The FA
Navigating the Data Journey in Professional Rugby League
In the age of technology, a wealth of data representing different aspects of sports performance is collected. To prevent data overload, optimising how this data travels from collection to presentation to coaches is crucial to embed data into decision making. This presentation will provide an overview of the key approaches we adopt to navigate this data journey at the club and how our research with Leeds Beckett University underpins our approaches. Specifically, the presentation will cover how we use data to understand our training process and how it can manage important outcomes such as injury and fitness.
Dan Weaving
1st Team Sport Scientist
Leeds Rhinos Rugby League Club
Fireside chat: Profiling the competition pre-Olympics
Join Sarah Henderson, Performance Analyst at English Institute of Sport as she takes us on a journey of profiling the competition and implementing this into training of athletes in the run up to the Olympic games. This session will be a one on one, insightful discussion into the successes, challenges, tools used and effectiveness of such profiling.
Sarah Henderson
Performance Analyst
English Institute of Sport
Networking Coffee Break
Hand & Wrist Injuries in Boxing: What has made the difference
Hand and Wrist injuries have a 10-15% prevalence across most sports. In GB Boxing, we have observed up to 35% incidence, with training availability significantly compromised. How did we go from 50% of boxers unavailable due to injuries in these areas before Beijing 2008 to a much healthier squad? When we crunch the numbers what is our data telling us? This presentation will discuss the prevention and conditioning strategies employed over the course of the last two Olympic cycles that have led to the current positive health status. Join us on this journey!
Ian Gatt
Lead Physiotherapist
GB Boxing
Coach-Led Analytics: Using Data to Improve Team Performance
Moneyball, the
bestselling book and Hollywood movie, shows how the Oakland A’s, a small-market
team in Major League Baseball, have used data analytics to develop a “David”
strategy to compete with resource-rich goliaths such as the New York Yankees. Moneyball has encouraged teams around
the world to embrace analytics as a potential source of competitive advantage. But
too often Moneyball has been seen as
a triumph of analysis over expertise and experience. Bill, a former consultant
with the A’s, has developed coach-led analytics with several teams in different
sports around the world. In his presentation, Bill will share the lessons he
has learnt on how to integrate data analytics effectively into the coaching
process. He will argue that it is crucial for teams to have a strong cultural
commitment to evidence-based practice in which coaches and analysts have a
mutual respect for each other’s contributions to the continuing search for the
best ways to improve team performance.
Bill Gerrard
Professor of Business & Sports Analytics and Data Analyst
London Irish
You're not fit to referee?
This talk will look to de-bunk the terrace chant and provide insight into the physical demands placed upon the elite English Referees. With their performance under the microscope more than ever, we will explore how the game has changed and how refereeing fitness continues to develop, to enable the officials to be in the right place, at the right time to make those important decisions.
Francis Bunce
Sports Physiologist
Professional Game Match Officials
Networking Lunch
The role of data in returning a player from injury
The decision
to return a player to training and match play post-injury is both difficult and
multifactorial in nature. Ensuring the player is sufficiently conditioned to
return to competition, with minimal risk of injury recurrence, underpins the
design of the rehabilitation process. As a multi-disciplinary support team, we strive
to return the player in a better physical condition with increased physical
capacities than pre-injury, with the aim of making them more resilient and
robust to injury risk in the future. Data provides objectivity within the
complex high performance environment , and is used in partnership with previous
case studies and the personal experiences of members of the sports
medicine team in order to make decisions effectively and
efficiently. This presentation will describe
how data supports the design and monitoring of a safe progressive return to
play, and give insight into the rehabilitation process at Southampton FC.
Laura Bowen
First Team Data Scientist
Southampton FC
Utilising Data Effectively: Helping make more Informed Decisions
It’s clear that there has been a huge rise in the use of Data Analytics within Sport, and nowhere more so than at the elite level. However, as practitioners in the field we must ask ourselves whether we are using data effectively? Are we maximizing its potential, or letting it go to waste? At Leicester City we use a variety of methods to manage and analyze our data; in an attempt to help us make more informed decisions about training, performance & recovery.
Tom Joel
1st Team Sport Scientist - Leicester City FC
Leicester City FC
Conducting sports research: Staying efficient and obtaining accurate data
Join a panel of experienced sports professionals as they divulge their research journeys in the world of sports. Hear the similar and the contrasting insights of methods, approaches, challenges and successes from real case studies. Jack will be joined by Ryan Chambers, Sports Scientist at Welsh Rugby Union and John Fitzpatrick, Sports Scientist at Newcastle FC.
Sports Research Panel
Experts
Liverpool FC, Welsh Rugby Union & Newcastle FC
Networking Coffee Break
Lessons learnt: Overcoming common data hurdles and maximising impact
The modern era of professional sport has brought with it access to large amounts of data. Too often the impact of the information the data holds is blunted by our ability to effectively use it. When looking to maximise the impact of our data we must overcome common hurdles that are both intrinsic to using large and diverse data but also specific to the environment in which you are working in. This presentation will discuss how Nick has overcome some of these common hurdles in his career and present examples of how this has been done in both First Team and Academy football. To do this it will focus on both data management at source and new successes in how we report and feedback information.
Nick Coleman
Sports Science Analyst
Everton FC
Effective season planning: Improving player preparation through the use of statistics
British cricket requires careful, conscious pre-season planning to ensure the best performance in the busy season. Strength and Conditioning Coach at Nottinghamshire Cricket, Ross Herridge, will be providing his technical based insights into using statistics to implement solid training methods in their coaching practices and sharing the challenges they have faced and solutions they have found season to season.
Ross Herridge
Strength & Conditioning Coach
Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club