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Publications
  • 2016
  • Conference Paper

The Pressing Game: Optimal Defensive Disruption in Soccer

By: Iavor I. Bojinov and Luke Bornn
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
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Abstract

Soccer, the most watched sport in the world, is a dynamic game where a team’s success relies on both team strategy and individual player contributions. Passing is a cardinal soccer skill and a key factor in strategy development; it helps the team to keep the ball in its possession, move it across the field, and outmaneuver the opposing team in order to score a goal. From a defensive perspective, however, it is just as important to stop passes from happening, thereby disrupting the opposing team’s flow of play. Our main contribution utilizes this fundamental observation to define and learn a spatial map of each team’s defensive weaknesses and strengths. Moreover, as a byproduct of this approach we also obtain a team specific offensive control surface, which describes a team’s ability to retain possession in different regions of the field. Our results can be used to distin- guish between different defensive strategies, such as pressing high up the field or sitting back, as well as specific player contributions and the impact of a manager.

Keywords

Soccer; Strategy; Disruption

Citation

Bojinov, Iavor I., and Luke Bornn. "The Pressing Game: Optimal Defensive Disruption in Soccer." Paper presented at the MIT Sloan School of Management, Cambridge, MA, March 2016.

About The Author

Iavor I. Bojinov

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

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More from the Authors
  • Nailing Prediction: Experimental Evidence on the Value of Tools in Predictive Model Development By: Daniel Yue, Paul Hamilton and Iavor Bojinov
  • On Ramp to Crypto By: Iavor Bojinov, Michael Parzen and Paul Hamilton
  • A Causal Test of the Strength of Weak Ties By: Karthik Rajkumar, Guillaume Saint-Jacques, Iavor I. Bojinov, Erik Brynjolfsson and Sinan Aral
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