Being originally from the UK I am a huge soccer fan and while the Euros are the other side of the Atlantic I have been following very closely. This year the German football team have been using Big Data & Analytics from SAP to give them the competitive edge. They have also been using a 'penalty insights function' to help goalkeepers and coaches spot patterns around how their opponents take penalty kicks.
While I personally think Italy's penalties in the shoot-out on Saturday were somewhat woeful there is no doubt that SAP's technology is an amazingly powerful tool that I am sure all soccer teams will in time implement - it's an interesting read...
When Germany met Argentina at the 2006 FIFA World Cup quarter-final for a penalty shoot-out, then-goalkeeper, Jens Lehmann, brought with him a crumpled piece of paper onto the pitch. It was a cheat sheet written by his goalkeeping coach and contained tips on how to stop Argentina's likely penalty takers. Germany won the shootout 4-2.
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