Liverpool FC Research Articles

TacticAI: an AI assistant for football tactics

Identifying key patterns of tactics implemented by rival teams, and developing effective responses, lies at the heart of modern football. However, doing so algorithmically remains an open research challenge. To address this unmet need, we propose TacticAI, an AI football tactics assistant developed and evaluated in close collaboration with domain experts from Liverpool FC. We focus on analysing corner kicks, as they offer coaches the most direct opportunities for interventions and improvements. TacticAI incorporates both a predictive and a generative component, allowing the coaches to effectively sample and explore alternative player setups for each corner kick routine and to select those with the highest predicted likelihood of success. We validate TacticAI on a number of relevant benchmark tasks: predicting receivers and shot attempts and recommending player position adjustments. The utility of TacticAI is validated by a qualitative study conducted with football domain experts at Liverpool FC. We show that TacticAI’s model suggestions are not only indistinguishable from real tactics, but also favoured over existing tactics 90% of the time, and that TacticAI offers an effective corner kick retrieval system. TacticAI achieves these results despite the limited availability of gold-standard data, achieving data efficiency through geometric deep learning.

Songs to learn and sing

Based on over 50 years of the author watching Liverpool FC (LFC) football matches, this article examines the use of songs in and around such matches, locating it within wider debates about the use of song at football matches.The development of modern media’s relationship to football will be considered in three main areas – the importance of television in the modern age, the availability of songs on the internet and the use of the sound systems to control fan behaviour at matches. The article aims to provide some insights in to one of the most important – but often neglected – aspects of football fandom. It does so by examining the place of Liverpool Football Club (LFC) within the city, football and the media, fandom, singing at football matches and the particular nature of LFC songs. The article concludes by suggesting that it is in the singing of songs that true football fandom is found.Keywords: singing at football matches, Liverpool FC, popular music, football fandom, Spion Kop

OLSC France : comment supporter à distance le Liverpool Football Club dans un monde global

Remote supportism is an avatar of globalisation. Communication techniques allow, but do not explain, the process by which an individual, by voluntary and definitive choice, inscribes in his social practices a devotion to a football club that is not located near his residence. The personal trajectories of the members and those of the Liverpool FC are hybridised. In order not to focus on anachronistic representations of hooliganism, entering the world of OLSC, the French branch of Liverpool FC supporters, is a critical invitation to travel in the company of those “who never walk alone”.

Space Invaders [Audio podcast episode

Though she was a life-long Liverpool FC fan, Doreen Massey felt like a “space invader” whenever she attended matches, as she’d often be one of the few women on football terraces. Inspired by Massey’s usage of the term, sociologist Nirmal Puwar developed it into a sociological concept to understand “what happens when women and racialized minorities take up ‘privileged’ positions which have not been ‘reserved’ for them”. In this episode we tackle space invading as an active verb.

Merseyside football and the slave trade

ABSTRACT This paper is about the roots of Everton Football Club and, given their shared heritage, Liverpool FC. It concerns a dimension to the history of both clubs that has been largely overlooked but should be considered in light of Liverpool’s ongoing civic reckoning with its historic slave trade connection. The research carried out suggests that the foundation period of professional football on Merseyside was marked by the patronage of well-known figures in Liverpool society who, directly or indirectly, profited from the exploitation of slave and other forms of coerced labour. It is contended that there was a reciprocal relationship between a cohort of club patrons and the evolving football scene in the city. It is also argued that Everton FCs recent commitment to memorialize the slave associations of the dock land site of its new stadium – a move it has reaped praise for – can also be viewed negatively as an underscoring of the ‘maritimisation’ of the impact of slavery, further obscuring the pervasiveness of the slavery story beyond maritime spaces.

Mohamed Salah or the Aesthetics of Ordinary Middle East Masculinities

On October 6 2020 The Sun reported an event where Mohamed Salah, the celebrated soccer player of the Liverpool FC and the Egyptian national team, had protected David Craig, a 50-year-old homeless man, from people harassing him at a petrol station. According to Mr. Craig, Salah first scolded the attackers and then gave him £100. Craig later declared: “Mo is a real-life hero in my eyes and I want to thank him,” hence the article’s title: “Have-a-Mo Hero.”

Sepakbola dan Kefanatikan: Kontruksi Makna Liverpool FC Bagi Seorang Bigreds Bogor

This study has an identification problem that seeks to find out the meaning of Liverpool FC for a Bigreds, as well as looking for a motive for a Bigreds who is in Bogor. The phenomenon of a fan supporting his team has been around researchers, especially Liverpool FC. But not many know how a Bigreds defines Liverpool FC club for themselves, and what their motives are to become a Bigreds. This study uses a qualitative method and a phenomenological approach, because in this study the researcher examines a phenomenon with the aim of finding out the meaning and motives of a Bigreds. This research is going well, researchers must examine in depth so that the informants provide true information. The theory used in this research is Alfred Schutz's phenomenological theory. The results of this study are Bigreds interpret Liverpool FC as their self-concept and their love for their proud club. The informant's motive for becoming a Bigreds is based on family motives and social motives.
 Keywords: phenomenology, motive, meaning

Developing a Multicriteria Decision-Making Model Based on a Three-Layer Virtual Internet of Things Algorithm Model to Rank Players’ Value

This paper proposes a multicriteria decision-making model based on a three-layer virtual internet of things (IoT) algorithm to automatically track and evaluate professional football players’ performance over the Internet. The three layers were respectively related to (1) automated data reading, (2) the players’ comprehensive grey relational degree calculation, and (3) the players’ classification. The methodology was applied in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic to investigate the performance of the top 10 defenders (according to The Sun, an internationally renowned sports website) in the European leagues, participating in the knockout phase of the 2019–20 UEFA Champions League. The results indicate that Virgil van Dijk of Liverpool FC was the best defender, followed by Harry Maguire of Manchester United, and Sergio Ramos of Real Madrid in the second and third positions, respectively. However, this ranking contradicted that of The Sun’s, which ranked these defenders in the seventh, tenth, and eighth positions, respectively. These results can help club management, coaches, and teams negotiate price positioning and future contract renewals or player transfers.

This Means More: Branded Solidarity at Liverpool’s Soccer Clubs

Liverpool’s elite soccer clubs are at once carefully managed global brands and local institutions infused with community values. As billion-dollar companies, Liverpool FC and Everton FC deploy a tactic we call “branded solidarity”: leveraging the historical enactment of leftist politics in the city to appeal to a broader, global audience through value-laden marketing campaigns that frame the clubs as authentic representations of working-class solidarity. By reducing local traditions to marketable symbols of community, the clubs encounter resistance from fans, who periodically place limits on the capitalist endeavors of the clubs. In this paper, we offer a conjunctural analysis that focuses on the tensions and contradictions of branded solidarity through a close reading of each club’s marketing campaigns and discusses how these tensions played a role in the demise of the short-lived European Super League.

‘At the end of the storm, there’s a golden sky’: The importance of an English football anthem for the Swedish fans

The purpose of this article is to discuss the significance of Liverpool Football Club’s (LFC) anthem ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ (‘YNWA’) for Swedish fans of LFC. The song has been played before home matches at the Anfield stadium since the 1960s, and via the media, it has spread all over the world. We can therefore talk about a kind of satellite supporters who can be involved no matter where in the world they are. Based on a survey conducted with help from Liverpool FC Official Supporters Club Sweden, 378 people (355 men and 23 women) answered questions about their relationship to the city of Liverpool and the Liverpool football team, how long they have been fans and why they chose LFC, and, finally, their connection to ‘YNWA’. The results show that the Swedish fans feel a great sense of belonging to both the team and the city of Liverpool and that the song is very important to them even in everyday life. For the fans in the survey, ‘YNWA’ unites them with the team and fans from all over the world while separating themselves from other fans and football clubs with other anthems. The song thus becomes larger than itself. Identity and performances are important concepts on which the article is based.

Sport, the Media and Ireland: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Sport, the Media and Ireland: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

‘This heart-rending and world-shattering news’: gender, emotion, and transnationalism in the Bill Shankly retirement letters

ABSTRACT In July 1974, Bill Shankly, the charismatic manager of Liverpool FC, surprised the football world by announcing his retirement. During fifteen years in charge, Shankly revolutionised LFC, transforming a second-tier outfit into one of Europe's best teams. His impact on the city of Liverpool was equally profound. At times in the 1960s, Shankly's popularity eclipsed even that of the Beatles. His retirement, wrote one supporter, felt like ‘the end of the world’. It triggered a public outpouring of grief, well wishes, and reminiscences. Based on previously unpublished material from the Shankly Family Archive, this essay examines the history, or histories, of the correspondence sent to Bill Shankly in the summer of 1974. Using three approaches – gender history, the history of emotions, and transnational history – it highlights under-explored aspects of football's rootedness in everyday life: female fandom, male sentimentality, and the first stirrings of Liverpool's international popularity. In Bill Shankly's football republic, collective identity was rooted in civic pride, but crossed age, class, gender, and national lines.

The politics of urban regeneration in Liverpool and Everton FC’s alternate new stadium-project plans

ABSTRACT Urban politics is a US-dominated field, and since the late 1990s there have been academic discussions with a view, on the one hand, to better understanding the British/European case and what distinguishes it from the US one and, on the other, to develop a better comparative theory much of which subsequently went down the path of studying neoliberalism. This article follows an urban politics perspective and the qualitative case-study method to explore Everton Football Club’s 20-year-long unsuccessful struggle to relocate to a new modern stadium of its own in the Liverpool city-region. Although this paper has limitations stemming from the fact that it is a single case study, its contribution to the field is three-fold. First, it adds to the scant literature on new private sports stadia in the UK. Second, it shows that US-based urban politics theories beyond regimes may remain alive in the UK. Third, it supplements the neoliberalist–financialized city statecraft literature by adding sports stadia as infrastructural projects never before incorporated.

Optimization of The Best Line-up in Football using Binary Integer Programming Model

This paper aims to find the formation with the best line-up of the Liverpool FC football team in the English Premier League in the 2020/2021 season. Researchers used binary integer programming (BIP) modeling to determine optimum solutions. The data used for this optimization is the rating value of the players recorded in the performance data from the previous matches. The optimum result of this problem is the selection of variables that are valued at 1, namely {x_1, x_4, x_6, x_8, x_21, x_28, x_34, x_37, and x_39} for formations 4-3-3 with a maximum value of 82.47, and variables {x_1, x_6, x_7, x_8, x_11, x_14, x_16, x_29, x_31, x_32, andx_42} for 4-2-3-1 formations with a maximum value of 80.04. The 4-3-3 formation is more effective because it has a higher maximum rating than the 4-2-3-1 formation. 4-3-3 formation is an attacking formation with a higher intensity of attack and faster than 4-2-3-1 formation that tends to defend moderately.

Optimization of The Best Line-up in Football using Binary Integer Programming Model

This paper aims to find the formation with the best line-up of the Liverpool FC football team in the English Premier League in the 2020/2021 season. Researchers used binary integer programming (BIP) modeling to determine optimum solutions. The data used for this optimization is the rating value of the players recorded in the performance data from the previous matches. The optimum result of this problem is the selection of variables that are valued at 1, namely {𝑥1,𝑥4,𝑥6,𝑥8,𝑥11,𝑥18,𝑥21,𝑥28,𝑥34,𝑥37,dan 𝑥39 } for formations 4-3-3 with a maximum value of 82.47, and variables {𝑥1,𝑥6,𝑥7,𝑥8,𝑥11,𝑥14,𝑥16,𝑥29,𝑥31,𝑥32, dan 𝑥42 } for 4-2-3-1 formations with a maximum value of 80.04. The 4-3-3 formation is more effective because it has a higher maximum rating than the 4-2-3-1 formation. 4-3-3 formation is an attacking formation with a higher intensity of attack and faster than 4-2-3-1 formation that tends to defend moderately.

A Concept for Club Information Systems (CIS) - An Example for Applied Sports Informatics

Abstract In professional sports clubs, the growing number of individual IT-systems increases the need for central information systems. Various solutions from different suppliers lead to a fragmented situation in sports. Therefore, a standardized and independent general concept for a club information systems (CIS) is necessary. Due to the different areas involved, an interdisciplinary approach is required, which can be provided by sports informatics. The purpose of this paper is the development of a general and sports informatics driven concept for a CIS, using methods and models of existing areas, especially business intelligence (BI). Software engineering provides general methods and models. Business intelligence addresses similar problems in industry. Therefore, existing best practice models are examined and adapted for sport. From sports science, especially training systems and information systems in sports are considered. Practical relevance is illustrated by an example of Liverpool FC. Based on these areas, the requirements for a CIS are derived, and an architectural concept with its different components is designed and explained. To better understand the practical challenges, a participatory observation was conducted during years of working in sports clubs. This paper provides a new sports informatics approach to the general design and architecture of a CIS using best practice models from BI. It illustrates the complexity of this interdisciplinary topic and the relevance of a sports informatics approach. This paper is meant as a conceptional starting point and shows the need for further work in this field.

Champions in the Age of COVID-19

ABSTRACT How should sport deal with prematurely ended seasons? This question is especially relevant to the current COVID-19 interruption that threatens to leave many leagues without champions. We argue that although there can be no winners, in certain situations there should be champions. Relevant to the current situation, we argue that Liverpool FC—currently with a 22+ point lead—should be crowned champions of the English Premier League. However, things are not as simple as simply handing the championship to whoever was in the lead when a season is prematurely ended. Through analogy with a fictional decathlon competition—and with the understanding that sporting seasons are themselves a type of game—we identify three reasons why leading at the moment of cessation is insufficient to be crowned a victor (of an individual event) or a champion (of a season-long competition): doing so fails to respect some valuable skills, fails to allow for luck to play out in an interesting way that affects competitions, and fails to respect competitive strategies. This discussion can then inform determining what, if any, end-of-season accolades are relevant, such as championships, relegation, or promotion. No team can win in a league that has failed to be completed, but there can still be a champion.

Football, fashion and unpopular culture: David Bowie’s influence on Liverpool Football Club casuals 1976-79

ABSTRACTThis article examines the influence of an outfit worn by David Bowie in The Man Who Fell to Earth and on the cover of Low, upon the earliest football casuals – those of Liverpool FC from 1976–79. The significance of this outfit, a seemingly unremarkable duffle coat, is drawn out in order to demonstrate the nuanced rituals, acts and structures that make fashion a set of practices and social relations as well as a culturally loaded object. This case study demonstrates Bowie’s transmedial flow between film, music, sporting arenas, fiction and television interviews and his related contribution to the transference and creation of fashion cultures in a pre-digital age. It considers the value and shortcomings of subcultural studies when trying to understand a culture that is not one’s own, as well as the marginalization of casuals within analyses of subcultures generally. This article builds a methodological framework that draws upon theories of costume in film, fashion in fiction and existing research on working class dandyism and football culture. Representations of this outfit in the work of author Kevin Sampson – an ‘active participant’ in these new cultures – are analysed to demonstrate the role that clothing and emulation play in the relationship between a performer and their audience.

“Tanked up Yobs” and “Self-Pity City”. Deconstructing the Myths of the Hillsborough Disaster

On 15 April 1989, Liverpool FC played Nottingham Forest in an FA Cup semi-final at the Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield in northern England. Catastrophic errors by the police and other organisations led to the deaths of 96 Liverpool supporters, crushed against the perimeter fences on the Leppings Lane terrace. Though the horrific facts of the disaster were quickly and widely known, they were lost beneath another narrative, promoted by the police, numerous politicians, and large sections of the media. This narrative blamed the disaster on “tanked up yobs”: drunk and aggressive Liverpool supporters, who turned up late and forced their way into the ground. Over the subsequent years and decades, as Hillsborough campaigners vainly sought justice for the disaster’s victims in a series of trials and inquests, the destructive allegation remained in the public realm. It was reinforced by establishment dismissal of Liverpool as a “self-pity city”, home to a community incapable of accepting official verdicts or of leaving the past in the past. This essay uncovers the history of the myths of the Hillsborough disaster. It first shows how these myths were established - how false narratives, with powerful backers, shifted responsibility for the disaster from the police to supporters, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. It then examines how these myths were embedded in public discourse - how Liverpool was demonised as an aggressively sentimental city where people refused to admit to “killing their own”. It finally analyses how these myths were overturned through research, media mobilisation, and grassroots activism, a process that culminated in the 2016 inquest verdict, which ruled that the 96 Hillsborough victims were unlawfully killed. In doing so, the essay shows how Hillsborough became a key event in modern British history, influencing everything from stadium design to government legislation.

#walkouton77: football fan activism in Premier League

This article provides an analysis and a discussion of a protest over ticket prices among fans of the English football club, Liverpool FC. The protest was organized with the hashtag #walkouton77 and combined social media activity with a massive walkout during a globally televised football match. I explore the #walkouton77 protest from two perspectives: Firstly, how fan-activity transformed a franchised TV football match into a transmedia event. Secondly, how fan activism combines cultural and political dimensions as well as offline and online dimensions. It is suggested that football fan activism holds distinguished fan activism potentials demonstrated by the #walkouton77 movement influencing the LFC owners’ club-as-commodity discourses by promoting a club-as-culture discourse. It is concluded the football fans are able to function as collective cultural critics thereby obtaining a position as co-authors of the club as a cultural institution.