frequently asked questions
1. What is the SPR?
SPR is the acronym for our ‘Soccerment Performance Rating’, i.e. a set of proprietary algorithms, that we use to evaluate the performance of football players. It takes into account every match event, weighted through ad-hoc coefficients. The various events (rebased to ‘per 90 minutes’) form the contribution of a player to the defensive, buildup and attacking playing phase of her/his team. These contributions are then weighted according to the player’s role (for example, the attacking contribution will weigh more for a forward and less for a defender).
In line with what we do for the overall stats, we show the SPR of a player when she/he has accrued at least 270 minutes of playing time.
In order to reward performance consistency and limit short-term hypes, the SPR is adjusted by taking in consideration the playing time. At 270 minutes of playing time. the adjustment is 84.7%. It reaches 100% when the footballer has played at least 1800 minutes in the league (in most leagues, this equals to half a season, plus one match). Therefore, every additional minute above 270 and up to 1800 minutes is worth 0.01% of SPR.
2. Why do we only show the players with more than 270 minutes on the pitch?
In our view, 270 minutes represents a good trade-off between having performance data with statistical relevance and not missing out the possible outperformers with not much playing time.
3. What does “P90” mean?
P90” literally means “per 90 minutes”. In order to better compare the performances, we rebase the players’ total stats per 90 minutes, i.e. the normal length of a league match.
4. What are the defensive, build-up and attacking contributions?
We regroup the match events into the three playing phases. As an example, “shots on target” enter into the attacking phase, “accurate passes” are within the buildup phase, while the “tackles won” enter the defensive phase.
All the events, both positive and negative, are weighted through internally-developed coefficients. The player’s contributions to the three playing phases represent the foundation of our Soccerment Performance Ratings.
5. How do you gather the data?
The data feeds are produced and made available by Opta Sports, a Perform Group company. We recalculate the match events and rebase all of them on a ‘per 90 minutes’ basis.
All the ratios, such as the accuracy or conversion ratios, are calculated by Soccerment and may differ from the ones as calculated by Opta.
6. How do you select the list of similar players?
The selection of the three most similar players is fully automated and purely quantitative. There is therefore no subjectivity involved, which might explain some surprising, sometimes counterintuitive, results. We use an algorithm of hierarchical clustering, populated by 20 key stats per 90 minutes, height and weight.
We strongly believe that it is the best way to approach such kind of selection. It is also important to stress that, taking our generic spider charts as a reference, the list is selected among the players having the same role of the player and having the most similar shape, rather than the area size, of the respective spider chart.
7. How does the SPR Curve forms?
The SPR Curve shows the trend of the player’s performances throughout the season and over the years.
Our dataset is automatically refreshed on a daily basis and so are the calculations of the various stats and of the SPR of every player in the top five European leagues.
We populate the SPR Curve through weekly updates, set on Monday nights for all the players, for consistency purposes.
This also means that the list of top SPRs will be available on our website starting from Monday nights. On Tuesday mornings will update you on the lists through our social media.
As previously explained – see point 2 of our F.A.Q. – we start displaying a footballer’s SPR when she/he has played at least 270 minutes.
8. What are the role groups for classifying the players?
We classify the players through a set of eight different roles:
1. Goalkeepers (‘GK’);
2. Central defenders, or central backs (‘CB’);
3. Full-backs (‘FB’), including wing-backs;
4. Defensive central midfielders (‘DMC’);
5. Central midfielders (‘CM’);
6. Central attacking midfielders (‘CAM’);
7. Wide attacking midfielders (‘WAM), including wingers;
8. Forwards (‘FW’), including strikers.
9. Distribution of total passes
We show the breakdown of total passes (both accurate and inaccurate), depending on whether they were directed forward, backward, to the right or to the left. The breakdown offers additional insights regarding the passing ability of the player and sheds some light regarding her/his typical routines.
10. Accuracy and success ratios
For all the outfield players, we display the percentage of successful events on total attempts, for six metrics. For instance, the number of accurate passes as a fraction of the total attempted passes.
11. Role specific ratios
We select four performance ratios for each role-specific template (Goalkeeper, Defender, Midfielder, Forward). For example, for goalkeepers we display the ratio of the saves made out of the shots against (total, from inside the box and from outside the box).
12. Is there a contract binding me to Soccerment Analytics?
No, there is no contract. Any subscriber could decide to cancel her/his subscription at any time and without incurring in any penalty.
13. What is my status?
After signing up, in ‘My Profile’ you can view your current status. For now, there are only two statuses: “Fan” and “Analyst”, with the latter destined to the users having an active subscription. In the next few months, the “Analyst” will be able to upgrade her/his status to “Analyst Premium” and access even more in-depth, engaging and compelling analytical tools.
14. What are the Soccerment Points, how do I gain them and what can I do with them?
Soccerment Points is a system by which we intend to reward the users’ engagement and their active promotion of our products and services.
Currently, there are three ways to gain the Soccerment Points (SMP): a) Referrals; b) Links sharing; c) Specific contests on Facebook..
Referrals: in ‘My Profile’, click on “Refer Soccerment Analytics to your friends” and a code will be automatically generated. Copy the code and send it via email, SMS, WhatsApp or even post it on your social media. For every friend that will use that code to complete the signup, you will receive 100 SM Points and your friend will receive 50 SM Points.
Links sharing: By clicking on the button “share” (normally located below or beside a chart), you can select on which social media you would like to share that chart. For every different person clicking on the link and viewing the content, you will receive 1 SMP.
Facebook contest: Every now and then we will launch a knowledge-based contest on our Facebook page and reward the winners with Soccerment Points (the amount of points could vary depending on the contest’s difficulty).
Please note that any misuse of the referrals and/or of the link-sharing system will not be tolerated and we reserve the right to delete your profile and account if we believe that you are violating or have violated our Terms & Conditions, Guidelines and/or applicable laws, or if your profile is offensive or inappropriate.
Examples of when we may delete your user profile and account include, but are not limited to:
– It is not attached to a valid email address, including if the provided email address has expired or is no longer accessible by you. We
need you to sign up to our services using a permanent, personal email address because we may need to get in touch with you. This means that we do not accept the use of temporary or disposable email addresses. If you have used such an email to create an account then we will delete your user profile and account.
– Your user profile contains an offensive or inappropriate picture or username.
– Your user profile or account has been used to create fabricated reviews or otherwise misuse our Website or services.
– You have created multiple user profiles. You may only have one user profile on Soccerment. If you create more than one user profile we will ask you which one you want to keep and delete the other profiles. If you don’t get back to us within the specified timeframe, we will remove all but one of your profiles at our discretion.
– If your user profile and account is deleted, the reviews attached to that user profile and account will also be deleted.