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Complexity emerges in measures of the marking dynamics in football games

A. Chacoma* and O. V. Billoni

M. N. Kuperman

  • Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola (IFEG-CONICET), Ciudad Universitaria, 5000 Córdoba, Argentina and Facultad de Matemática, Astronomía, Física y Computación, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Ciudad Universitaria, 5000 Córdoba, Argentina

  • Instituto Balseiro, Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, R8402AGP Bariloche, Argentina and Centro Atómico Bariloche and CONICET, R8402AGP Bariloche, Argentina

  • *achacoma@famaf.unc.edu.ar
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Phys. Rev. E 106, 044308 – Published 28 October, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.106.044308

Abstract

In this article, we study the dynamics of marking in football matches. To do this, we survey and analyze a database containing the trajectories of players from both teams on the field of play during three professional games. We describe the dynamics through the construction of temporal bipartite networks of proximity. Based on the introduced concept of proximity, the nodes are the players, and the links are defined between opponents that are close enough to each other at a given moment. By studying the evolution of the heterogeneity parameter of the networks during the game, we characterize a scaling law for the average shape of the fluctuations, unveiling the emergence of complexity in the system. Moreover, we propose a simple model to simulate the players' motion in the field from where we obtained the evolution of a synthetic proximity network. We show that the model captures with a remarkable agreement the complexity of the empirical case, hence it proves to be helpful to elucidate the underlying mechanisms responsible for the observed phenomena.

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synopsis

No Hiding Place for Lazy Soccer Defenders

Published 28 October, 2022

Network theory can show how successfully a soccer team performs when it’s on the defense.

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Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. E 106, 044308– Published 28 October, 2022
  • Received 15 July 2022
  • Accepted 16 September 2022
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