For a moment, Kenny Robinson was a trailblazer. He was the first to follow a new path to the NFL draft, one that put money in his pocket and bypassed the restrictive structure of college football. If all went well in the coming years, dozens of players would leave school early and follow his route through the XFL.
But the XFL’s unexpected demise closed that door for the foreseeable future, making Robinson one of the most unique draft prospects in history. He is a former All-Big 12 safety at West Virginia who, at age 21, has a half-season of professional football on his résumé.
During five games with the XFL’s St. Louis BattleHawks, Robinson intercepted two of the eight passes thrown into his coverage, according to Pro Football Focus charting. ESPN draft analyst Mel Kiper Jr. projects him as a Day 3 prospect in next week’s draft, meaning he could be selected in the late rounds or targeted as a priority undrafted free agent. But if nothing else, Robinson emerged from the experience convinced he had accelerated his professional timeline by two seasons.
Washington Capitals forward T.J. Oshie admits that if the NHL decides to restart its season with empty arena games at neutral sites, he has a preference on the location.
“I want to play. Doesn’t necessarily matter too much where it is. But obviously, North Dakota is the No. 1 place I’d want to play in the world, so that would be amazing,” said Oshie, who played three years with the Fighting Sioux from 2005 to ’08. There has been speculation that the University of North Dakota is among the sites the NHL is considering for games this summer.
Like other players, Oshie expressed a desire to complete the 2019-20 season and said he’ll be ready if there’s a green light to do so.
Ryan O'Hanlon, No Grass in the Clouds newsletter from
… While he took about 16 percent of the team’s shots while he was on the field at Roma, my man has leapt up to 28, 25, and 24 percent, in order, during his three years with LFC. The first season was absurd, one of the few Messi-like seasons England has ever seen, as Salah generated more attacking production — non-penalty goals and assists — than any player in league history other than Luis Suarez. That was driven mainly by some lightning-in-a-bottle finishing and a big increase in shots: 3.42 per 90, compared with 2.32 in his final Roma year. He was great in Italy, but this was something else.
“If anything, the overarching comment for Salah applies to all their front three [including Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino],” James told me. “They all looked like good signings, but nobody could have predicted that they all hit the top end of their potential. Nobody thinks the three of them are anything less than world class now, and that they all have hit that is something of a surprise.”
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has revealed his players have been in constant communication with a psychologist during the suspension of the Premier League.
The Gunners squad have not been together as a group since Arteta was diagnosed with coronavirus over a month ago as they self-isolated and then stayed training at home when the lockdown measures were introduced.
It is an unusual situation for the players and Arteta is keen to ensure they get any help they need.
John Ruddy believes one of the hardest tasks for Premier League footballers right now is finding a balance between keeping fit and over exerting from their own homes.
Ruddy and his Wolves teammates, like footballers across the country, are following training plans at home to maintain shape, ready for the return of the Premier League, a date for which remains unknown due to the current ongoing pandemic. Ruddy himself is following the advice of Wolves’ sports science department and has shed some light on trying to keep sharp, away from training and matches.
… “Everything from dumbbells to kettlebells, barbells and spin bikes to treadmills – everything was distributed to players,” Ewens told the West Ham United club website.
“We’ve also provided them with cones and balls, so they can at least get a little touch of the ball and keep their technique up at home.
“The next challenge was obviously giving them appropriate work to do. Myself and the rest of the sports science and medical teams have worked hard to make sure that every player has an individual running conditioning programme and an individual strength programme which gets communicated to them on a daily basis.
When we exercise, we often experience a temporary (and reversible) reduction in strength, which is called “fatigue.” Importantly, it is the loss in strength (the ability to voluntarily produce muscle force) that is the definition of fatigue, and not any accompanying feelings that we might have.
Most of the time, we don’t stop to think about how this reduction in strength occurs. Yet, it is useful to think about fatigue by looking at the sequence of events by which we produce muscle force, and then consider the ways in which fatiguing mechanisms can impair each of these events.
We examined the practice activities employed by 53 youth football coaches working in youth academy professional top-division clubs from England, Germany, Portugal, and Spain. This is the first study to explore the microstructure of coach-led practice in elite youth football across multiple countries. A total of 83 practice sessions from under-12 to under-16 age groups was collected in situ. Sessions were analysed for the proportion of time in ‘non-active decision-making’ (e.g., unopposed technical or tactical skills practices, fitness training) and ‘active decision-making’ activities (e.g., small-sided games, skills practice with opposition), with the latter deemed superior for the transfer of game intelligence skill to match play. More time was spent in active decision-making (M = 62%) compared to non-active decision-making activities (M = 20%) and transitioning between activities (M = 17%). Players from Portugal and Spain spent a higher amount of time in active decision-making activities compared to English and German players, whereas, English players spent more time in unopposed technical-based drills and German players in improving fitness aspects of the game without the ball. Findings extend previous research assessing coach-led youth football practice in single countries by demonstrating differences in training activities between countries in Europe. [full text]
When faced with a decision, people may know which choice gives them the best chance of success, but still take the other option, a new study suggests.
People may choose based on a “gut feeling,” a habit, or what worked for them last time, rather than on what they have learned will work most often, said Ian Krajbich, co-author of the study and associate professor of psychology and economics at The Ohio State University.
The results run counter to the belief that people make the less optimal choice because they just don’t know any better.
“In our study, people knew what worked most often. They just didn’t use that knowledge,” Krajbich said.
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… Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology are working to combine the accuracy of sleep clinics with the convenience of wearable computing by developing machine learning models, or smart algorithms, that provide better sleep measurement data as well as considerably faster, more energy-efficient software.
The team is focusing on electrical ambient noise that is emitted by devices but that is often not audible and can interfere with sleep sensors on a wearable gadget. Leave the TV on at night, and the electrical signal – not the infomercial in the background – might mess with your sleep tracker.
These additional electrical signals are problematic for wearable devices that typically have only one sensor to measure a single biometric data point, normally heart rate. A device picking up signals from ambient electrical noise skews the data and leads to potentially misleading results.
“We are building a new process to help train [machine learning] models to be used for the home environment and help address this and other issues around sleep,” said Scott Freitas, a second-year machine learning Ph.D. student and co-lead author of a newly published paper.
… The stellar line-up from some of the world’s most innovative brands from sport and tech have signed on to the project and will work as mentors alongside the Tennis Australia team. Venture capital fund Blackbird General Partner Nick Crocker, Barcelona FC Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer Javier Sobrino, and video editing giant Grabyo CEO Gareth Capon, are just some of the big name leaders whose expertise will help drive the innovation.
“To have mentors from other sporting organisations, who are leading the way in this space like Javier from Barcelona FC and Daniel Brusilovsky from Golden State Warriors as well venture capital experts from Blackbird, @M8, Rampersand, Airtree and Reinventure, is a real bonus for the program,” Reid said.
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Researches at Purdue and Stanford concluded that slightly changing the starting stance of offensive linemen would lead to at least a 40 % reduction in hits to the head.
The study determined that if offensive linemen started a play standing up – rather than with their fingers touching the ground – the move would eliminate a “significant number of hits without affecting the game.”
Based on research, offensive linemen absorb more head impacts than any other player on the football field.
“An offensive lineman tends to start off in a three-point stance, which means that one hand remains in contact with the ground until the start of the play, similar to sprinter fashion. The first move is always to come up, and most players tend to lead with their head,” Eric Nauman, a Purdue professor of mechanical engineering and basic medical sciences said in a statement released by the school.
… “We were in the era where mistakes were made, when we were trying to get to grips with (sports science). I saw a lot of good things and I saw an awful lot of bad things,” [Joe] Cole, who made his debut aged 17 in 1999 for West Ham United, told me in an interview.
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“The reason football’s the beautiful game is because it’s not easy to quantify statistically … it’s the most popular game because anything can happen. Sports science is constantly changing so you want to be at the forefront of it.”
His interest in the area has seen Cole invest in Apollo, a company that offers teams across any sport a fully customizable data management system.
Danish club FC Nordsjaelland are a club proud to do it differently. Before football’s lockdown, Sky Sports’ Johnny Phillips went to find out how their academy-led approach is paying dividends on and off the pitch.
Twenty years ago, at a disused football stadium in the town of Dawu, in Ghana’s Eastern Region, the Right to Dream football academy was founded.
It was the idea of Tom Vernon, an English football coach and Manchester United scout working in the country, who believed that through sport and education children from extreme poverty could have the opportunity to build a better life for themselves.
… As a response to the coronavirus pandemic, leagues are considering applying for permission to make five substitutions per match rather than the usual three. The motivation behind it is preserving players from injury as they’ll necessarily need to play a very congested schedule when the 2019-20 season resumes, but it’s the sort of change that ought to be considered on a permanent basis for the simple reason that it reduces footballers’ minutes on the pitch.