{"id":6201,"date":"2022-06-03T16:16:46","date_gmt":"2022-06-03T16:16:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent"},"modified":"2022-06-03T16:33:47","modified_gmt":"2022-06-03T16:33:47","slug":"my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent","title":{"rendered":"My candid view – Can better data make African football more transparent?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Sierra-Leone. <\/strong><\/span>Soccer is Africa\u2019s most popular sport, but finding comprehensive data on the game in the continent to help in decision making is often a challenging task. Sometimes data are not available, or they are fragmented.<\/p>\n

Rainbow Sports Group, a US-based company that provides management, marketing, and media solutions for sports agencies and African soccer players, this year launched an interactive data platform for African soccer.<\/p>\n

The African Football Data Centre surfaces information about player valuations, sponsorship deals, broadcasting revenue, stadia, and the social media performance metrics of players, federations, and competitions.<\/p>\n

It asserts the potential to turn subjective opinions into hard facts. It may also increase transparency in a debilitatingly corrupt industry.<\/p>\n

Soccer stakeholders need insights<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you don\u2019t have a scientific opinion, it becomes very subjective,\u201d Kingsley Pungong, CEO of Rainbow Sports Global said. \u201cWhen it\u2019s subjective, it becomes a subject to varied interpretations. That\u2019s why our football is mainly not appreciated because everybody has a subjective opinion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pungong adds that lack of proper data on African soccer leads to undervaluation of the continent\u2019s players, clubs, and other sports assets.<\/p>\n

Agents, marketers and other stakeholders on the continent can use global soccer websites that provide updates and results, but these are not Africa-focused and rarely go beyond general numbers like game scores. They need more detailed numbers on players, clubs, and leagues.<\/p>\n

The websites may be unreliable too, says Michael Mwebe, a Dar-es-Salaam\u2013based consultant at Siyavuma Sports Group, a South African sports management company.<\/p>\n

In January, for example, he was trading a soccer player to a Ugandan club but couldn\u2019t ascertain how many goals the player had scored the previous year. One website said 11 goals, another 13, and the player himself said he\u2019d scored 14.<\/p>\n

Such shortcomings force soccer agents and other stakeholders to use \u201cinformal\u201d channels to get insight into the sport in the continent, Mwebe said, including using google, social media connections, and soccer journalists. However, he added, a person providing the information may have a bias toward a player.<\/p>\n

There are exceptions to data availability though, as statistics for soccer players who have played for their national teams or in the CAF Champions League, the highest level of African club soccer, are more readily available for example.<\/p>\n

How does African Football Data Centre work?<\/p>\n

The African Football Data Centre has a research team that collects primary data from the internet and it works with soccer federations, leagues, and players around the continent. It was developed in partnership with KPMG Football Benchmark, which offers tools for analysing operational, financial, and digital performances of soccer clubs.<\/p>\n

Rainbow Sports Group plans to also partner with clubs in Africa to be able to collect data on their players. \u201cIf you want to say this guy is good enough for Bayern Munich, you just don\u2019t say it as being subjective opinion, you say it based on a scientific assertion,\u201d Pungong said.<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Sierra-Leone<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Sierra-Leone. Soccer is Africa\u2019s most popular sport, but finding comprehensive data on the game in the continent to help in decision making is often a challenging task. Sometimes data are not available, or they are fragmented. Rainbow Sports Group, a US-based company that provides management, marketing, and media solutions for sports agencies and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":6200,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6,8],"tags":[291,293,292],"class_list":["post-6201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-files","category-homepage-english","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-sierra-leone","tag-sierra-leone"],"yoast_head":"\nMy candid view - Can better data make African football more transparent? - Sierra Leone<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Soccer is Africa\u2019s most popular sport, but finding comprehensive data on the game in the continent to help in decision m ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"My candid view - Can better data make African football more transparent?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Soccer is Africa\u2019s most popular sport, but finding comprehensive data on the game in the continent to help in decision m ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sierra Leone\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-06-03T16:16:46+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-06-03T16:33:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/sites\/16\/2022\/06\/postQueueImg_4-629a37d55503b.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"502\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"My candid view – Can better data make African football more transparent?\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-06-03T16:16:46+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-06-03T16:33:47+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\"},\"wordCount\":511,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/sites\/16\/2022\/06\/postQueueImg_4-629a37d55503b.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Sierra-Leone\",\"Sierra-Leone\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"files\",\"homepage-english\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/sierra-leone\/all-news\/my-candid-view-can-better-data-make-african-football-more-transparent\",\"name\":\"My candid view - Can better data make African football more transparent? 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