ABSTRACT
Data visualisation is an area developing strongly in sports journalism. Via the example of football in Germany, this article presents a survey of current potentials of data journalism in sport. We have analysed the challenges of assessing and publishing data in professional online sports journalism. By means of five interviews with experts and an analysis of the content of three special-interest blogs, trends in the use of data in sports reporting, as well as the potentials and dangers, were shown. Here, we can identify, above all, the complexity of football, the incorporation of data without any context, the danger of tailoring data to a topic, as well as mistakes in entering data as problems. For sports journalists, relevant are a lack of (technical) knowledge, the increasing time pressure and growing expectations of recipients. Our analysis reveals that data must not be seen as the equivalent of objectivity. It does not seem possible to capture an entire sporting competition with data-driven journalism. It has become clear that the demands on sports journalists will grow in future, if they want to add value for recipients by applying data.
