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- Is futsal a donor sport for football?: exploiting complementarity for early diversification in talent developmentPublication . Travassos, Bruno; Araújo, Duarte; Davids, KeithIntroduction: In team sports like football, athlete development emerges through the continuous experience and practice of varied activities under variations in task and environmental constraints. Such variations in environmental and task constraints provide variable practice opportunities and experiences that promote an enrichment of the learning process through enhanced transfer, and the discovery of individual capabilities through diverse, functional play activities. Objectives: In this commentary, we discuss theoretical insights that suggest how the sport of futsal can provide a useful basis for supporting the transfer of skills to performance in association football. Conclusions: The complementary nature of the two sports can be exploited for skill acquisition in early diversification through emphasising selected performance–based affordances, behavioral correspondence between sports, and self-evident advances towards task goals. By taking up futsal at an early stage, future football players will have the opportunity to explore futsal tactical behaviors that will enrich their developing perceptual-motor landscape. Practial Implications: To ensure a complementary transfer of capabilities between the sports, coaching interventions should highlight informational constraints to improve the coupling of perception and action in players in futsal and association football and promote the utilization of relevant affordances available in practice task designs.
- Field location and player roles as constraints on emergent 1-vs-1 interpersonal patterns of play in footballPublication . Laakso, Timo; Travassos, Bruno; Liukkonen, J.; Davids, KeithThis study examined effects of player roles on interpersonal patterns of coordination that sustain decision-making in 1-vs-1 sub-phases of football in different field locations near the goal (left-, middle- and right zone). Participants were fifteen U-16yrs players from a local competitive amateur team. To measure interpersonal patterns of coordination in the 1-vs-1 dyads we recorded: (i) the relative distance value between each attacker and defender to the centre of the goal, and (ii), the relative angle between the centre of the goal, each defender and attacker. Results revealed how variations in field locations near the goal (left-, middle- and right-zones) constrained the relative distance and relative angle values that emerged between them and the goal. It reveals that relative position of the goal is a key informational variable that sustained participants' behaviours for dribbling and shooting. Higher values of relative distance and angle were observed in the middle zone, compared to other zones. Players' roles also constitute a constraint on the interpersonal coordination for dribbling and shooting. Additionally, it seems that players' foot preference constrains the dynamics of interpersonal patterns of coordination between participants, especially in left and right zones. The findings suggest that to increase participants' opportunities for action, coaches should account with field positions, players' roles and preference foot.
- How football team composition constrains emergent individual and collective tactical behaviours: Effects of player roles in creating different landscapes for shared affordances in small-sided and conditioned gamesPublication . Laakso, Timo; Davids, Keith; Luthanen, Pekka; Liukkonen, Jarmo; Travassos, BrunoThe aim of the present study was to examine how team composition of players with different roles constrains individual and collective tactical behaviours, and ball possession effectiveness, during competitive 3 vs 3 small-sided and conditioned games (SSCGs) in youth soccer players. Fifteen male players (under 15 yrs, mean age 13.2 1.03 years, mean years of practice: 4.2 1.10 years) from the same club participated in this study. For analysis purposes, on advice from the coaching staff, participants were categorised according to their main team performance role, resulting in sub-samples of 5 defenders (centre-backs ¼ 2 and full- backs ¼ 3), 7 midfielders (central midfielders ¼ 3 and wide midfielders ¼ 4) and 3 attackers (forwards). In order to assess participant tactical behaviours, a notational analysis system was created with four categories: i) team behaviours, ii) individual players’ offensive actions, iii) individual players’ defensive actions, and iv), ball possession effectiveness. Analysis of players’ offensive actions revealed that the team composed only of midfielders revealed a higher frequency of diagonal and vertical passes in relation to the attackers’ team. In offensive individual actions, the attackers’ team revealed more dribbles in relation to the teams of defenders and midfielders. Analysis of ball possession effectiveness revealed that the team of defenders achieved higher values of shots on goal compared to the team of midfielders. These findings exemplified how playing role constrains the emergence of different collective behaviours and individual actions in 3 vs 3 SSCGs.
- Interpersonal Dynamics in 2-vs-1 Contexts of Football: The Effects of Field Location and Player RolesPublication . Laakso, Timo; Davids, Keith; Liukkonen, Jarmo; Travassos, BrunoThis study analyzed the spatial-temporal interactions that sustained 2-vs-1 contexts in football at different field locations near the goal. Fifteen male players (under 15 years, age 13.2 ± 1.03 years, years of practice 4.2 ± 1.10 years), 5 defenders, 7 midfielders, and 3 attackers, participated in the study. Each participant performed a game to simulate a 2-vs-1 sub-phase as a ball carrier, second attacker, and defender at three different field locations, resulting in a total number of 142 trials. The movements of participants in each trial were recorded and digitized with TACTO software. Values of interpersonal distance between the ball carrier and defender and interpersonal angles between players and between the goal target, defender, and ball carrier were calculated. The results revealed a general main effect of field location. Generally, the middle zone revealed the lowest values of interpersonal distance and angle between players and the right zone and the highest values of interpersonal distance between players and interpersonal angle between players and the goal. Related with participants' roles, defenders revealed subtle differences as attackers on interpersonal distances and relative angles compared with midfielders and attackers. Findings supported that field location is a key constraint of players' performance and that players' role constraint performance effectiveness in football.
- Adaptive behaviours of attacking futsal teams to opposition defensive formationsPublication . Travassos, Bruno; Bourbousson, Jérôme; Esteves, Pedro Tiago; Marcelino, Rui; Pacheco, Manuel Filipe Samagaio de Sousa; Davids, KeithThis study evaluated tendencies towards flexibility/stability of coordinated behaviours in international futsal teams, considered as complex collective systems, according to changes in opposition defensive formations. Six games of two international futsal teams (Spain and Portugal) were selected for Social Network Analysis to capture the coordination tendencies that emerge in the tactical behaviours of players when performing against different defensive formations. Ball trajectories in each offensive pattern of play were notated in an adjacency matrix where each entry accounted for the linkages between 12 spatial field areas. Each offensive play was coded according to the defensive formation of an opposing team (i.e. conservative or risky formation). Results revealed similar network properties between teams when competing against more risky defensive formations, while notable differences were observed against conservative defences. Effect of defensive formation of opponents on macro network properties was observed in both the Portuguese and Spanish teams. At a meso-level, only the Spanish national team exhibited notable changes, suggesting a greater level of adaptability to unfolding performance events. The observed flexibility in tactical behaviours of the Spanish team appeared to express their greater expertise levels.
- Capturing and Quantifying Tactical Behaviors in Small-Sided and Conditioned Games in Soccer: A Systematic ReviewPublication . Coito, Nuno; Davids, Keith; Folgado, Hugo; Bento, Teresa; Travassos, BrunoPurpose: To systematically describe and analyze the tracking systems, the variables, and the statistical methods used to evaluate the players and teams’ tactical behavior in small-sided and conditioned games (SSCGs). Methods: A search was done in Web of Science, PubMed, Science Direct, and Scielo databases to identify manuscripts published between 2008 and 2019 that manipulated small-sided and conditioned games (SSCGs) and analyzed tactical behaviors of players and teams. Results: From 349 articles identified, 31 were selected for review. To collect positional data, the global positioning system (GPS), the local position measurement (LPM) system, and TACTO were identified as reliable tracking systems. Twenty-one positional variables were identified to evaluate tactical behaviors, grouped into five main categories: team balance, playing space, width and length of playing space, and interpersonal distance. Tactical behavior patterns were analyzed using approximate entropy, sample entropy, Shannon entropy, and patterns of coordination between players and teams were analyzed using relative phase and running correlation. Discussion: The tracking systems analyzed were reliable but revealed different advantages and disadvantages of their use. Authors should define the use of each tracking system based on their purpose and level of precision required for analysis. A great duplication was observed on the variables used with similar purposes of tactical analysis. The identification of the variables according to their purpose of analysis will allow a better understanding of their use in the future.