Data and technology company Stats Perform has agreed a multi-year deal with Dutch AI-based visualisation company Beyond Sports for the usage of its positional tracking data of football’s English Premier League.
Under the agreement, Beyond Sports, which specialises in analysing and visualising positional tracking data in order to create virtual match simulations, plans to extend its already existing usage of the data to more broadcasters and entertainment outlets worldwide. Beyond Sports has already delivered content from the Premier League and Dutch Eredivisie in recent seasons.
“This partnership and especially the specific usage of the data is the first of its kind and we believe it offers tremendous opportunities for the next generation of football fans,” said Matthieu Lille-Palette, senior vice-president of Opta, Stats Perform.
In June, Stats Perform renewed its official media data deal with the Premier League, Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) and English Football League (EFL). The company agreed the multi-year deal with Football Data Company (FDC), the firm that manages the leagues’ collective data rights. Some additional betting rights were signed off by FDC’s official betting partner, Genius Sports.
The agreement grants Stats Perform the rights to collect detailed data for over 6,000 matches per season across the English Premier League, PL2, U18 Premier League, Scottish Premiership, EFL Championship, EFL League One and EFL League Two and distribute it to media, fantasy operators and professional teams.
It also grants the company the rights to distribute official player tracking data to rights-holding broadcasters and official player market data to licensed sportsbooks and fantasy operators to power pre-game and in-play betting on player-specific statistics such as shots, passes and tackles.
For the first time, the company is also distributing the rights to a new suite of AI-powered data insights created through a partnership between FDC and tracking technology provider Second Spectrum, which is also the official tracking partner for the NBA and MLS.
Stats Perform last week announce a new collaboration with the Premier League and Second Spectrum. For the first time, the Premier League’s highest level of official player and team level eventing data has been synchronised with tracking data to provide new metrics and insights to fans.
As the official tracking provider of the Premier League, Second Spectrum delivers its player and ball tracking data for every match, using advanced computer vision to automatically identify and provide the precise coordinates of each player and the ball 25 times a second.
Second Spectrum synchronises its tracking data and Stats Perform eventing feeds to add new context and tactical information. The two parties said this new Insight Feed is the most comprehensive and robust set of football data available.
The feed includes a wide range of metrics and data points such as pressing, shot velocity, passing probabilities, and off-ball runs.