The Digital Life of a Football Match – Chelsea vs. FC Nordsjaelland

Sport, statistics and social media is pretty much the heart of a recent event held at one of SKY’s HQs in Leeds. Two of the Umpf team were lucky enough to be extended an invitation to the talk which was a part of the Leeds Digital Festival.

The event kicked off with three short talks from Simon Edgar, Marketing and Business development Manager at Pro Zone, Simon Banoub, Director of Marketing at Opta as well as Piers Croton, Director of Content at Skybet. The presentations gave a flavour as to the amount of digital work which goes on within the city as well as getting to know each company, their backgrounds and which fields they operate within.

The talks were kept brief as the centre of the event was really to do with how these companies use their respective systems and tools during live sporting events. We were using Chelsea vs. FC Nordsjaelland in the Champions League as our test subject. In a testament to how well organised this event was, Skybet provided each attendee with a test account with £20 virtual credit in to bet, the bets had to be won at the half time stage and the best punter won £100 free bet!

Once the match had commenced we were invited to wander around the room at our own leisure and take the time to ask questions and learn. Each company had a station with computers and screens and employees from within the company showing us what they would do if they were working on this game in real time.

The stands:

Skybet

What data it records and how this data is then absorbed by professional footballers and the clubs themselves.

Digital extras such as SkyGo and Score Centre

Social media (mainly twitter and Facebook)

Live match commentary

In play betting explained

Opta

How its data is recorded

A chance to see how it compiles statistics for accounts such as OptaJoe

Pro Zone

An insight in to how its camera system operates

I have to admit to being a major geek when it comes to football and numbers; I just think it adds so much more depth to the game. I was taken aback a bit by the depth by which you can get into it using Opta and Pro zone systems and it is no wonder accounts like OptaJoe on twitter are so popular.

A fascinating and informative event, hosted superbly by Sky and I am led to believe organised heavily by Helen Jacobs of Sky.

Thanks to everyone who helped organise the event. If you also attended, we’d be really interested to hear your feedback too – just message us below and we look forward to hearing from you.