Abstract
Current knowledge of gaze behavior in football has primarily originated from eye-tracking research in laboratory settings. Using eye-tracking with elite players in a real-world 11 v 11 football game, this exploratory case study examined the visual fixations of midfield players in the Norwegian premier league. A total of 2,832 fixations by five players, aged 17–23 years (M = 19.84), were analyzed. Our results show that elite football midfielders increased their fixation duration when more information sources became available to them. Additionally, participants used shorter fixation durations than previously reported in laboratory studies. Furthermore, significant differences in gaze behavior between the attack and defense phases were found for both areas of interest and fixation location. Lastly, fixation locations were mainly on the ball, opponent, and teammate category and the player in possession of the ball. Combined, the results of this study enhance the knowledge of how elite footballers use their vision when playing under actual match-play conditions. They also suggest that laboratory designs may not be able to capture the dynamic environment that footballers experience in competition.
Highlights
Visual perception in sport has attracted widespread interest from researchers and practitioners alike (McGuckian et al, 2018b)
We examined the average fixation duration for fixations conducted at different player-to-ball distances (n = 2,770, 62 missing)
The analysis revealed that the participants fixated more on the ball and opponent (B/O)/T and player in possession (PiP) categories than any other fixation location, the results for the comparison between the B/opponent and teammate (O/T) and the O/T categories being the exception (p = 0.292)
Summary
Visual perception in sport has attracted widespread interest from researchers and practitioners alike (McGuckian et al, 2018b). Research has generally shown that expert athletes have superior perceptual skills compared to non-experts (Mann et al, 2007). Expert athletes engage in more effective visual search strategies and focus on more relevant areas compared to less skilled athletes (Williams et al, 1999). This behavior has been replicated in a wide variety of sports and tasks, including football (Savelsbergh et al, 2002), tennis (Murray and Hunfalvay, 2017), handball (Rivilla-García et al, 2013), and volleyball (Piras et al, 2014). Gaze behavior research commonly distinguishes between smooth pursuits, saccades, pursuit tracking, and fixations (Duchowski, 2007)
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