Data Connect: Zurich (Onsite/Hybrid) on Soccer Analytics

Is women’s football different from men’s? This is the question we asked the students at ETH (Zurich, Switzerland) for the KNIME student challenge held in November 2023.

We gave two datasets: tens of thousands of events such as passes and shots during matches at the latest #FIFA Men’s and Women’s World Cups. Both are publicly available from data company StatsBomb. Could a machine learning model reliably distinguish between matches played by women or men, but without using athletic features such as top speed? If yes, which would be the most important factors for the prediction? This was the challenge.

51 students signed up, 17 teams were formed, 4 weeks of time was allocated to give the answer. On Friday November 24, 2023 the submitted projects were evaluated and the winners were proclaimed.
During this event we will hear and discuss the results from the top 3 winning teams and we will use this chance to hand out the prizes as well.

Agenda

4:00 PM - 4:15PM - Welcome by the "Soccer Analytics" challenge organizing committee

4:15 PM - 4:50 PM - Can technical and tactical features alone distinguish men’s and women’s football?" by 1st place winner team Kshitijaa Jaglan, Gordana Marmulla, Ivana Smokovic, Hadi Sotudeh

4:50 PM - 5:25 PM - "Leveraging Soccer Event Data: A Classifier to Distinguish Between Men’s and Women’s Football" by 2nd place winner team Quynh Anh Nguyen

5:25 PM - 6:00 PM - "Differences Between Men’s and Women’s Football: Tactical Analysis with KNIME" by 3rd place winner team Hrvoje Krizic, Simon Zehnder

6:00 PM - 7:00 PM - Networking

In case you can't attend this event onsite in Zurich, please register here for the online stream.

Onsite Location
ETH HG E 33.5
Rämistrasse 101, 8006 Zürich, Switzerland