Intro

The purpose of this blog is to educate and discuss sports and technology, and how they cooperate in order to benefit the world. Topics can range from specific technological advances within the football arena, to overall effects through time. Without further ado....There is a current debate that has been racing for years in sports, and in football (soccer) specifically. People are always trying to decide who the best player ever is, and have been trying to figure out the different ways to measure it. What is painfully obvious is that technology has a lot to play in how players have not only advanced in this day and age, but also how we are able to keep track of it. In the 20th Century the only way you would be able to view sports from all over the world would be for you to actually be there in person. Soccer greats such as Pele, Platini, Maradona, Cruyff and others were not able to get the coverage and advantages that technology brings to the forum now. Now we can sit at home and flick from channel to channel, seeing spanish, french, german, dutch, and any other major country that our heart desires all because of technology. Players like Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo defy the laws of gravity from game to game, and technology allows us to analyze them and see how they function. With every step, with every jump, with every swing of their feet we are able to collect data, track speed and agility and decifer where which player may differ from the other. We are able to recreate these movements and apply them into the very video games that entertain us. I had the opportunity to experience this once, where I was a participant in a study of why women football players suffer more knee injuries than men. In the study many small sensors were placed in specific positions all over my body so that my movements could be captured and digitized. They observed the way my knees reacted to hitting the ground from a predetermined height and from there, how it manouvered as I sprinted in a certain direction. I was thoroughly fascinated by the study and the technology used by the researchers and was very grateful to be a part of it. Technology has revolutionized the game in the way we play it, watch it, and study it. As time goes by, it will continue to improve more and more. We currently await the arrival of goal line technology, a technology that will have a significant impact on the sport at its highest stage.