Coaches Corner by Spiideo
Part 2: Analyzing the Opposition
Advancing Performance: Inside Our High-Tech Coaching Approach
Video analysis is at the center of everything we do. Before training we have video meetings, during training, we record everything thanks to our Spiideo camera system, and after training we use Spiideo Perform to evaluate training. It’s always ready to be viewed instantly. It’s the same with our matches, we prepare for upcoming opponents by analyzing their games in the Spiideo League Exchange setup for Allsvenskan, and then all our games are recorded automatically by Spiideo cameras. Spiideo is like a silent colleague – and one we really value.
In this series of blog posts, I will be guiding interested readers through our everyday work with Spiideo. The four parts of this series are the following:
Part one – The analysis process of breaking down a game
Part two – Analyzing the opposition
Part three – Using Spiideo in the training week
Part four – Individual development work
The Game Preparations
In the last post, I guided you through how we use Spiideo to break down our games and to provide the basis for our post-match analysis. In this post, I will discuss how Spiideo helps us in our preparation for games.
Before the game
One of the major assets for us in our preparation for upcoming opponents is that the Spiideo camera setup at all Allsvenskan stadiums provides us with the possibility of viewing all Allsvenskan games from a tactical camera that captures all players at all times. This helps us in building a thorough analysis of each opponent. As I mentioned in the last post, some stadiums have camera angles behind the goals for an even more detailed analysis product, but the Virtual Panorama angle alone tells us all we need to know.
The first step in the analysis process is going into the “Leagues” section of the Spiideo App to get access to all the games we want to watch. Personally, I instantly copy the games I have chosen to my “Recordings” section where I can tag the games with my normal tags in a very efficient way. The image below highlights what the “Leagues” section looks like.
Then it is just about choosing the right games. I prefer to watch the games where opponents play against teams that are somewhat similar to us as that might give me an inkling of how they might set up against us. Normally, I watch around 15-20 minutes of each half. I find that to be enough to get to the information we want when planning.
For presenting to the players, I use the same tools to illustrate my points as when I analyze our own performances. The video below highlights how we presented some keys prior to our game against Djurgården in September.
Thanks to the animation tools within the system, we can join the video footage with graphic tools to emphasize our points to our players as we carry out our pre-match meetings.
During the game
The Spiideo camera system also has a function for us during the game. Since the game is being recorded live, we can instantly watch the action from the sideline from a much better angle than we are able to on the sideline. In the video below, I break down how we made use of this tool during the Djurgården game.
As highlighted by that video, the live element of the Spiideo system is hugely important for us. We can instantly identify spaces that are available, why an opponent can stop us in a specific area or how we can improve our pressing by adapting to a surprising tactic without having to wait until after the game has finished. As such, Spiideo helps us impact the game as it is happening. This makes for an incredibly valuable way of also feeding information to our head coach during the game. At IFK Värnamo, we have no analysts sitting in the stands sending information through, so we need tools like this one to help us perform as well as possible with the resources we have. In that way, Spiideo is crucial.
