All posts tagged: soccers

The Download: soccer’s data renaissance and China’s big nuclear plans

The Download: soccer’s data renaissance and China’s big nuclear plans

Published by skeptic

5 SpaceX’s listing price is expected to be revealed todayIt could lead to the biggest IPO ever. (NPR)+ And turn 4,400 employees into millionaires. (NYT $) 6 EPA scientists say they’re pushed to downplay risks of household productsThey’re under pressure to alter reviews of chemicals in products. (CNN) 7 Anthropic has walked back a policy that “sabotaged” researchIt would have limited Claude’s ability to develop competing AI models. (Wired $) 8 Congress wants in on the data center backlashMembers are jumping on the fervor with new policy plans. (Axios)+ Should we be moving data centers to space? (MIT Technology Review) 9 Your search results are getting sloptimizedCompanies are gaming the chatbot internet. (Atlantic $) 10 Scientists have discovered that humans prefer to walk anticlockwiseIt’s a discovery that could improve crowd and evacuation management. (Guardian) Quote of the day “We’re the extracted and exploited colony of what is going to be one of the most highly valued entities in the world. People are going to die because of this pollution.”  —Justin Pearson, who represents portions of …

Inside soccer’s data renaissance | MIT Technology Review

Inside soccer’s data renaissance | MIT Technology Review

Published by skeptic

Davis and his team of researchers employ advanced data analytics to reveal a range of (beg your pardon) game-changing findings that are shifting pro clubs’ decision-making. “His lab is the most influential sports analytics lab in soccer,” says Hugo Rios-Neto, data recruitment lead for Royal Sporting Club Anderlecht in Belgium. They’ve helped teams better evaluate their rosters, conceived ways to assess how efficient (or not) strategies are, and developed algorithms that uncover hidden tactical patterns. Like, for instance, the value of kicking the ball out of bounds close to the goal and letting your opponent throw it back into play—a move that’s been popping up in some of the world’s top leagues over the last few years. To make the statistical argument for this seemingly counterproductive move, Davis’s group built a training data set composed of more than 1.4 million passes and some 60,000 throw-ins—partly from the 2022 World Cup. They used tree ensemble models (essentially a mashup of decision trees) to simulate the tactic. The conclusion, which the researchers presented in a 2024 paper …

Inside U.S. soccer’s World Cup camp at Orange County Great Park

Inside U.S. soccer’s World Cup camp at Orange County Great Park

Published by Sam Flores

On a recent spring morning, Championship Soccer Stadium, which sits in a corner of the Orange County Great Park in Irvine, was quiet and empty save for the dozen sprinklers quenching a newly laid grass carpet. Normally the well-used stadium is a buzz of activity. But its main tenant, the Orange County Soccer Club, which plays in the second-division USL Championship, has been temporarily evicted, left to train in the nearby park and play its final home game before the World Cup at Eddie West Field in Santa Ana, 12 miles away. (Not that it was necessarily a bad thing since the club drew a home-record crowd of 7,651 to its 3-2 win over Oakland on Saturday, which allowed it to hold onto second place in the Western Conference table.) During the next month, the nine-year-old venue will have just one occupant, the U.S. national soccer team, which has chosen the stadium as its main training base for the World Cup. The temporary change in ownership is heralded by a giant orange orb the size …