Leicester Tigers, the English rugby team, finished last in the sport’s Premier League in 2019, narrowly avoiding relegation. That’s when the club turned to artificial intelligence to evaluate player performance and model how different actions would affect the club’s likelihood of winning.
From then on there was no turning back. The team won 2022 The Premier League topped the table among 13 other teams thanks to artificial intelligence tools created by London-based sports data company Prospect and its subsidiary Oval.
Similar successes in cricket, football and other sports point to the potential of AI to change sport as we know it.
The technology has many applications, including helping clubs scout players, analyze their performances and plan tactics against opponents in ways previously considered too complex. It also opens up new opportunities for fans and teams to interact with each other, catering to the ever-growing interest in the sport.
“AI is giving sports venues new opportunities to commoditize fan and athlete data, deepening their understanding of their customers and stakeholders, and making their brand more attractive to investors,” Motasem El Bawab, chief information officer at the Barcelona-based consultancy. N3XT Sports spoke Luck.
Meaning? The impact of AI on fan interest, team performance and overall competitiveness in sports could increase the value of sports clubs.
In accordance with Deutsche Bank Analysts, sports mergers, acquisitions and investment deals have increased in value eightfold to about $37 billion in just four years. As you can see, sports attract big money with Saudi Arabia interest in football when he paid Cristiano Ronaldo millions of dollars, making him the highest paid athlete ever. Interestingly, this timing precisely coincides with the moment when interest rates rose sharply in response to high inflation, which led to a decline in the number of transactions in other industries.
Artificial intelligence is one of the reasons why sports clubs have emerged victorious, the bank said in a statement last week. This also means the onus is on sports teams to find better data tools and use them more effectively to stay ahead of the competition.
“Detractors argue that sports statistics will become a zero-sum game once they are available to every team. We are convinced otherwise,” bank analysts Luke Templeman and Galina Pozdnyakova wrote last week. “We argue that the proliferation of sophisticated sports data analytics will level the playing field in leagues dominated by a small number of teams.”
How does AI help you make big money?
A lot goes into evaluating sports clubs. In addition to financial indicators such as profit, the quality of the team, who plays for it, and its track record are also important.
With the AI tools available to teams, there are many opportunities to do what they do better, El Bawab said. He provided an example of how more effective operational and management strategies can directly increase ticket and merchandise sales.
“All of these factors can significantly improve the valuation of a sports club, demonstrating the potential for higher and more sustainable earnings,” he said.
Given everything that goes into such forecasts, reliable data is key. For example, FC Barcelona uses footage from past soccer matches to assess opponents’ behavioral patterns and develop game plans accordingly. The England women’s cricket team has partnered with Prospect to use artificial intelligence to select the right players for different opponents, simulating simulated matches using thousands of scenarios.
“For the most ambitious and innovative teams, there is now a great opportunity to take advantage of all these opportunities. [computing power and modeling tech] and dare to do things a little differently,” said Jack Tozer, co-founder of Prospect. Luck. “The teams that can use AI better than others will undoubtedly win.”
Mark Lilley, partner at Deloitte and head of the UK sports industry, said Luck that while sports organizations are still preparing for increased investment in artificial intelligence and data, these technologies are likely to play a significant role soon.
“As AI becomes a standard tool for competitive advantage, teams with strong AI capabilities and associated advantages may become more attractive for investment, potentially leading to increased value,” Lilly said, cautioning that AI “will not solve every problem” even if it very powerful.
For athletic staff who are skeptical about how AI works, Lilly says, “human experience, intuition and leadership will continue to be critical to success.”
Seb Daly – Sportsfile/Getty Images
Creating a Greater Impact on Sports Fans
No matter the sport, fans are the lifeblood of the industry. Their interest helps boost the popularity of various clubs and leagues, attracting legions of fans to stadiums and motivating players.
Even though fans have long been a core part of the sport, they still lack engagement, said SentientSport CEO Ryan Beal. Luck.
“In the season there is a wave when there is a match day and a few days before the match it all builds up into a game and then after the match it subsides again,” he said. When interest wanes, teams lose the engagement of their fans, which opens up a huge monetization opportunity that AI can help realize.
This could be new content based on fan preferences so that each person interacts with their chosen team individually. AI tools can also help teams like Manchester United interact with fans around the world in their native languages. Manchester United’s revenues fall record high of £648.4 million ($805 million) in 2023, but there’s a chance that figure could nearly double if the company benefits from artificial intelligence, Beal said.
Digital experiences that drive fan numbers could open up a whole new source of revenue for sports clubs that have until now made money from ticket sales, sponsorships and television rights.
The transition to the use of artificial intelligence is already in full swing, said Templeman from Deutsche Bank Luck that all sports teams are discussing how to use AI, the only difference is how they decide to implement it.
As more cases arise where established teams rely on new technology tools, others will also begin to implement similar capabilities to keep up.
“Data can help small teams become big… [and] big teams will start to monetize their fan bases around the world,” Beal said. “So, either you become a disruptor and everyone else catches up to you… or [you find] new inefficiencies that need to be exploited to stay ahead of the game, and that’s what makes the sport so exciting.”