Because Everyone Like's Winning

Almost no player in the modern era personifies what quality off-the-ball play is supposed to produce than Lionel Messi. While the majority are focused on the magic he creates when he has the ball (and a lot of it is pure magic), it's all of that time he spends off it where is he is creating equally influential and meaningful impact. 

• What is he actually doing?
• Why is he just walking at times?
• What calculation(s) is he making?
• How are his observations changing his own positioning on the field

It's truly a mystery to most observers but it is not a mystery to us and for the trained eye it's not either. The problem has been how to represent it and replicate it.

He is very intentionally determining every moment that is another opportunity, while maximizing his energy, and the space available to him when he does not have the ball. He is the off-the-ball expert and it empowers him in ways that players much bigger, or faster, or stronger cannot compete with no matter how impressive they might appear to be. Keep in mind, Messi is 5'7" and 165 pounds. Size is important in some cases but it is not everything. 

How anyone of any size manages the field and space is way more important

Even the best clubs on the planet struggle with understanding space. In this clip Everton gives up a goal to Manchester United in what is a clear collapse of the defense, a lovely pass/through ball, and then is left with no actionable data in real-time or near real-time to adjust.

You'll see Frank Lampard go behind the bench, watch a video replay of what happened with another coach, and he is left with only a visual display in his head of what went wrong and very little data-wise to analyze what to do next other than the visual of watching the replay. 

They ended up losing 3-1.

Pyramids abound! And to climb or to get relegated lower down on them can literally be determined by a single point at the end of a season. 

So the real question is; if you are tracking what everyone else is tracking, how are you ever going to climb to the top of the pyramid? Sadly, you won't. 

At Impact we know that; which is why we are maniacally obsessed with the concept of space management and how it influences a match, a single player, a team, recruiting, training, or even both teams on the pitch. 

It is the 87 minutes Johan talked about for decades as a coach at Ajax and Barcelona when it came to player assessment and managing matches. It was what defined great players <-- That is the thing and that is our thing.

If you want to break that cycle, climb the pyramid faster, move players along, recruit the most influential and differentiate your academy; let us show you a better and more efficient path forward. 

White boards are cheap and pretty simple to operate but after you've shown a situation you can never go back and do anything else with it. So the teaching moment happens and then its gone. Basically our philosophy is everyone else's with this one...you get what you pay for.

Keep the white boards for now but after a using our application for matches or practices; you'll be waltzing around with a tablet in a matter of minutes.