ABSTRACT
Chapter 2, “History of Match Analysis”, considers the development of analyzing soccer matches from 1863 to the present day, and gives a small insight into the potential future. Historically, it was not the sport of soccer that was “leading the way”, but the analysis work carried out in the sports of basketball, baseball and American football. The game of soccer with its responsible players – including coaches, managers, etc. – had acquired its own methods, which were increasingly based on experience and “good feeling”. The access or the cooperation with science with its new data-based findings was (and still is) not approved everywhere. The first beginnings of a scientific game analysis in Germany can be found in the research work carried out at the German University of Physical Culture in Leipzig in the 1960s. The development to date has been rapid and in many places a new occupational field –that of game analyst/scout – has emerged due to the inclusion of the extensive data. However, the potential is far from being exhausted – much of it does not yet meet the needs of practice. The foundation has been laid: the sport of soccer has long since crossed the threshold into science, but practitioners and theorists will need to work together much more and on a broader basis in future.
