In the opening video report, you can take a look at the football stadium where the Czechs will play against Georgia in their second match of the UEFA Euro 2024 European Championship this Saturday, June 22. It is the Imtech Arena in Hamburg – one of ten German stadiums, in which fans will watch a total of 49 matches.
Accepted and rejected
And as far as watching is concerned, it is also interesting to look at what new technologies accompany football today, even though some of them were previously rejected by the players themselves or even the coaches.
For example, we are talking about the so-called video assistant referee (VAR), which reviews the decision of the head referee according to the video recording. “I honestly believe that VAR is super important for modern football and there is no way we can go back from it. I believe it’s a fantastic tool and that we’ve kind of forgotten how many mistakes we made before VAR,” said UEFA’s head of referees, Roberto Rosetti, at a press conference on 12 June.
Although the decision of the video assistant sometimes takes a long time, and according to some, the live referee loses his authority, in June clubs in the Premier League voted 19:1 to use it. It was first used in 2018.
“VAR will intervene only if the goal was scored after a foul, offside or in the attacking zone. The main goal is to reduce wrong decisions in situations that can change the game. The protocol on when and how to use VAR was defined by the IFAB – the Council of the International Football Association,” adds Rosetti in the SZ Tech video report.
And here you can see what the technology looks like today and what other complete innovation the championship has introduced.
The latest news and also the absolute premiere
This is the International Broadcast Center (IBC) in Leipzig. This international broadcast center is 20,000 square meters. It is connected to all 10 stadiums by an optical cable and is the base not only for 27 broadcasting partners, but also for 400 workers, with 1,800 more located right next to the pitches. The video recordings are then handled by three operators.
Here, the so-called VAR rooms process data from 33 cameras that record every game, and the video assistant referee and his two assistants (AVAR) analyze it. 3D ball tracking technology is also used, which monitors whether the entire ball has really crossed the goal line. And from 2022, it uses 12 cameras as well as semi-automatic offside technology, which also tracks the ball and, in addition, 29 points on each player’s body. The algorithm accurately calculates their position 50 times per second and determines if they could be relevantly offside.
“UEFA is always looking for new technological solutions to improve the game and support the work of referees. And that’s what we want from semi-automatic offside technology,” adds UEFA’s head of referees Rosetti in the introductory video.
And for the very first time in the history of the European Championship, the so-called “Connected Ball Technology” is also used during the matches. Simply put, there is a chip inside the ball that detects even the slightest contact – for example with a hand. It sends signals up to 500 times per second.
For experts – it is an inertial sensor of the movement of the measuring unit (IMU) with a frequency of 500 Hz, which works on the principle of ECG and is located in the middle of the ball on special flexible cables. It charges wirelessly.
The technology has already been used at this year’s European Football Championship. In the match between Slovakia and Belgium. Her striker Romelu Lukaku sent the ball into the net in the end, but the goal was not valid. It was with the help of the chip that it was determined that passer Lois Openda first played with his hand.
2024-06-20 18:00:00
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