Development and importance of contextualised match play physical metrics in elite football

<p dir="ltr">Background: Whilst the individual relationships of ball possession and physical metrics, with overall performance has received some attention, how the physical metrics, and especially physical intensity, and possession interact with each other, and subsequently combine to influence team performance is relatively unknown. </p><p dir="ltr">Purpose: Therefore this study investigated the inter-relationships between possession, physical metrics and team performance. </p><p dir="ltr">Methods: Data from four separate seasons of a top European league were used to derive 80 team league performances (end-of-season points), as well as possession and physical data. Optical tracking and on-ball event data were used to derive absolute distances (m) during whole match and ball in play (BIP), and rates of distance covered (m^.min^-1 ) as the index of physical intensity during BIP, and notably when in-/out-of-possession, in total and within five speed categories. Pearson’s correlations were used to determine the relationships between possession, physical metrics and points, and mediation analysis was used to examine how the physical metrics and possession combine to influence performance. </p><p dir="ltr">Results: Overall possession (r= 0.794) and time out-of-possession within the defensive third (r= -0.797) were most strongly correlated with points. The strong relationships between in-possession distances and points appeared a coincidental and misleading effect of greater time in-possession enabling accumulation of inpossession distance. Physical intensity had a complex relationship with possession and points with opposite relationships according to possession status: lower physical intensity when inpossession and higher physical intensity when out-of-possession were associated with both possession and points. Mediation analysis revealed the direct, independent importance of possession for end-of-season points, however the association of physical intensity with performance was largely (>79%) mediated by possession. </p><p dir="ltr">Conclusion: Based on the findings we propose a novel model of the inter-relationship of physical intensity, possession and performance, whereby higher possession is the largest and direct contributor towards enhanced team performance, with lower physical intensity in-possession a consequence of higher possession, but greater physical intensity when out-of-possession a cause of increased possession.</p>