Using tracking data from the full 2025/26 LALIGA EA SPORTS season, we compared 225 players with themselves as starters and substitutes. Players produced more high-speed running per minute from the bench, and intensity increased further as playing exposure shortened. The pattern is consistent with pacing:...
What does “running more” actually mean in football? Across five LALIGA EA SPORTS seasons, the answer changes by team, season and metric. Total distance and high-intensity running often tell different stories, while league averages hide major differences. A match-by-match approach reveals why outrunning the opponent...
Traditional Voronoi models describe who is closest to each point on the pitch, but not necessarily who can reach it first. By incorporating player-specific locomotor characteristics derived from optical tracking—acceleration, braking, time-to-distance and directional change costs—we can estimate a more realistic form of spatial accessibility...
A player can return to competition with apparently normal high-speed running yet remain markedly underexposed to speeds close to his own maximum. Our new study in professional LALIGA footballers shows how absolute thresholds can conceal sprint reductions for up to 14 matches after hamstring injury—and...
Across 15 complete LALIGA seasons and 300 team-seasons, champions repeatedly showed the same performance fingerprint. Once raw volume, exposure and redundant metrics were controlled, the strongest signals were not simply more possession or more actions, but more productive possessions, stronger territorial progression, better chance creation,...
In LALIGA EA SPORTS 2025/26, 78% of coach-team units made their first substitution earlier when losing than when winning, with an average difference of 5.5 minutes. But timing alone does not define substitution strategy. Combining game-state-adjusted timing, substitution volume, bench exposure and temporal distribution reveals...