Believe it or not, nearly half of the world’s population watches football. Of course, not everyone is a hardcore fan and follows every big event, but it’s still incredible for a sport to have such a massive viewer base. There are many synergies between football leagues and other industries as they can help each other a lot. In fact, gaming and technology had a big impact on this sport, but football also helped these industries grow. Here we will talk about the impact of video games and technology in general on the most popular sport on the planet.
Brand Ambassadors for Video Games and Casinos
You have probably seen many sportsbook and casino websites that have a superstar athlete or another celebrity endorsing their website. These are obviously expensive deals, and gambling companies want to show they are trustworthy. Some of the best payout online casino sites often act as sponsors for big leagues or support a whole team. This helps the team grow and it helps football develop into a more spectacular sport. The same goes for video games like Fifa and football, they usually have famous players on their cover or box art.
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This is really important for the athletes too, as they can now have additional streams of revenue and diversify their careers. They are no longer solely bound by their contract, but rather have their own personal gigs.
Improved Training
It’s not surprising that football players of today are significantly more proficient than those half a century or a century ago. Thanks to the advancement in technology we were able to measure the progress and optimize training programs to get better results. Athletes can have more efficient diets, increase their endurance, run faster, and strike with precision. Today there are even apps that help guide your exercise and tell you how to isolate a specific muscle group or how to practice ball techniques.
So, if those kinds of things are available to the public, who knows what kind of secret recipes they keep in the league? Professional trainers don’t share all of their insights, as they are a crucial part of the success formula. People break records every year, and the competition is tight. So, someone who is an average player today would have easily been one of the MVPs in early 20th-century football.
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Too Much Focus on Stats
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Games have also skewed our view of football matches and how we evaluate teams. Football manager video games are almost as old as FIFA. Moreover, they really allowed people to reenact their fantasies of how their favorite team would look like. Someone who is a fan of Manchester United is thrilled when they hear Cristiano Ronaldo has renewed his agreement. But, there are still other players they would like to see in their favorite team. That being said, Manager video games work on algorithms and statistics. That’s how players receive measurement or the analysis of the team they created.
These games even gave birth to a whole new form of betting called fantasy sports, but again the outcomes are purely calculated through an algorithm. This leads to a false sense of security that you can guess the outcome of a certain match. Moreover, you view the quality of the player base on the stats available in the video game. Needless to say how this can lead to many frustrating situations, especially if you put your money on a team.
Fair Game
Match fixing and bribed judges have plagued pretty much every competition out there. Luckily, law enforcement and leagues were able to significantly suppress this behavior. First of all, it’s a lot more difficult to receive a bribe and easier to identify fraud, thanks to various advancements in technology. This acts as a deterrence as people know it’s not difficult to get caught and lose your career.
Additionally, we have better cameras and software that can calculate the trajectory of the ball. This helps judges make more accurate assessments, and it can also indicate whether a referee is really paying attention. Mistakes still happen, and there are some unfair decisions, but they are not nearly as prevalent as before when this tech wasn’t available.
Conclusion
As you can see, technology and video games have mostly had a positive impact on this sport. Moreover, it allowed people who love football to compete in different types of competitions like eSports. Fifa game tournaments happen regularly, and these gaming competitions are also very popular nowadays. We should also remember that technology helped the gambling business give more accurate odds and even offer betting entertainment during the pandemic. When there were no live matches, betting enthusiasts were only able to wager on fantasy sports and eSports.
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