Australian Football Has a GPS Brain
Football is a game where a win or loss can come down to a matter of inches. The official who makes that determination can have some of the pressure lifted from his shoulders if a GPS tracking chip is planted in the game ball.
No more questionable overturns on plays buried under a pile of bodies. No arguments about whether a player had control of the ball when he went out of bounds.
It’s not ready to happen in the U.S., where GPS technology manufacturers such as LandAirSea Systems dominate in vehicle tracking and fleet management applications. But next season, GPS tracking technology could settle a few spats in Australian-rules football.
Australian football and American football are really quite different. Throughout their histories, numerous fans have made a rather humorous attempt at comparison.
Catapult Technologies, an Australian company that designs and manufactures equipment for extreme sports, claims to have a GPS tracking football or “smartball” in trial at the Australian Football League (AFL). The company has cooperated in this project with Sherrin, the official supplier of game and training balls to the football league. Three clubs have tested the “bionic” ball in pre-season. According to the manufacturer, it’s just a matter of time before it’s widely accepted.
For years, Australian football players have been wearing GPS trackers with motion sensors called accelerometers. They were a good way to tell if an athlete was working at peak performance. The GPS tracking football, some say, is the next step and the way of the future.
The GPS tracking receiver planted inside the football is about the size of a pill. It records ball movement including exact location, speed and direction. If a real-time GPS tracking device is built into the ball, officials and telecasters could observe the progress of the game from a whole new, statistical perspective. A passive GPS tracking unit could also serve as the ball’s brain. In that scenario, the recorded data could be downloaded and studied in detail after the game or practice. A coach or commentator could use the GPS tracking statistics to determine how quickly the game progressed and how hard players worked to advance the ball in the field.
Combine the ball tracking with personal GPS tracking units on each player and the tracking system could provide a multitude of information. Officials would have insight into:
- If the team played zone versus man-to-man defense; and how much.
- If a player favored the corridor versus the outside.
- What events led up to a fumble.
- The direction, altitude and speed of the ball during a pass or kick.
The Adelaide AFL club tested the GPS tracking football. A coach is impressed with the performance but wary about costs. Converting to the high-tech balls would be an investment, said strength and conditioning manager Stephen Schwerdt, and the cost must be weighed against the benefits for the short term. It might initially be introduced as a tool in training, he said.
Reaction from the fans ranges from awe to skepticism.
“That would be insane! Anybody could ref with a GPS tracking ball like that,” a poster said recently on a sports fan blog.
Maybe part of the fun of football is the rivalry and controversial calls.
Source: News.com.au , Rootzoo
Tags: AFL, Australian Football League, brain, catapult technologies, controversial calls, gps game ball, GPS Tracking Football, Sherrin
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