International clubs are using an artificial intelligence system to determine which young players in Ghana most fit the description of current or recent top stars.
According to a publication by the Guardian, Eyeball, a digital scouting company, has supplied camera technology to capture fine-grain data on players in youth games across established football hotbeds such as Spain and France, Ghana, Senegal and Ivory Coast as well as smaller nations such as Burkina Faso.
The technology tracks each player’s run distances and speed, number of sprints, acceleration and deceleration over five yards and data such as how many sharp 90-degree turns players make.
Young stars must meet one of eight archetypes which includes the ideal “box-to-box midfielder”, “modern No 9”, “playmaking No 10” and “inverted wing-back”.
Also, former England defender Sol Campbell, has been involved in another AI-powered scouting startup, Talnets, which is tracking players in Ghana and other African countries like South Africa, Ivory Coast and Senegal.
Its founder, Darko Stanoevski, says AI scouting was “democratising a process that is very subjective and unfortunately driven by politics and the interests of certain people” – in particular football agents.