The Wisesport platform was used in Finnish Premier League’s championship series

Real-time football data enables automated tools and services.

The championship series of the Finnish Premier League, Veikkausliiga, was played using a fully automated Wisesport football analytics platform.

The scalable Wisesport system is known of thousands of games played in professional ice hockey leagues such as the KHL and the Finnish Hockey League. The real-time sports analytics platform enables completely new digital services via TV, mobile apps, and gambling.

Using the Wisesport football analytics platform, the Finnish Premier League (Veikkausliiga) became the first league in the world to use fully automated real-time football analytics in an entire championship series. Alongside sports clubs, different service provides can use data produced by the Wisesport platform both in arenas as well as at home.

The Wisesport platform allows offering real-time services around football matches. Similar features have already been introduced in professional ice hockey leagues that use the Wisehockey platform. The analytics system enables unique and appealing services and features via TV, mobile apps, and gambling. Real-time analytics are based on positioning technology and automated processing of coordinate data.

”Last year’s final Veikkausliiga game was already played with our smart football platform. Now we extended the platform into the entire championship series. This makes Veikkausliiga the world’s first football series to play all matches regularly with this kind of technology. All clubs in the championship series had access to visualized analytics and automated video clipping in real time,” says Miska Kuusisto, Head of Sales at Wisehockey Ltd.

”Our method of producing refined data from coordinate information in real time is unique. Currently even the biggest professional leagues cannot do the same. Even before, we have been able to do the same in ice hockey with Wisehockey, and the quick transition to football highlights the scalability of our analytics product. For providers of TV, gambling and arena services, our reliable real-time platform offers completely new ways to serve fans and reach a younger, digital-native audience, and this is only the beginning,” Kuusisto adds.

Fully automated analytics are easy to implement and use

In addition to unique analytics features, the Wisesport platform is easy to operate, which allows using analytics on a different scale from player development to professional games. Wisesport fully automates both analysis and daily routines. This means that no operating personnel are required at arena events. The platform requires no routine maintenance and zero upkeep measures between games or seasons.

”Starting from the installation process, we built the system robust and, most of all, free of maintenance. Installation takes two working days, and after that we do not need to visit the arena. Our first hockey arena has been working continuously for five years and it has hosted hundreds of games,” says Mika Hulkki, Head of Product at Wisehockey Ltd.

”For the positioning of players and the ball, we use Quuppa’s extremely light tags weighing six grams that do not require re-charging during a season. You can attach lightweight tags to gear such as jerseys. Nowadays, many professional teams use GPS positioning which requires wearing special vests because of the weight of the hardware. Those are quite impossible to insert into a ball, which makes the scope of analysis more narrow,” Hulkki adds.

The fully automated real-time Wisesport platform is a unique product even on the international level. The analytics platform, with a wide range of fan engagement services, is scalable for different-size organizations from individual clubs to full leagues, and it serves diverse users.

Earlier, the Football Association of Finland and Wisehockey Ltd agreed on a multi-year partnership, which concretizes in analytical collaboration and the Eerikkilä Training Center, the home of the Finnish national team. In Eerikkilä, young prospects play regularly using the Wisesport platform in training camps and international practice games. With the championship series of Veikkausliiga, smart football data has become part of Finnish professional-level football.