Performance Analysis Techniques in Applied Coaching Level 3

This program offers you an industry-focused insight in sport performance analysis and develops your ability to design an effective platform and athlete focused feedback to improve individual and team performance. The learning environment created on our course is designed to stimulate ideas and share practice. 

After undertaking Task 1 on Manual Notational Analysis this lecture will provide some clarity and insights into the applied techniques and practices for manual notation in sport. 

This lecture also consists of some indicative reading in the downloadable resource area. The objective of the study was to compose an objective and detailed notational analysis system for small-sided soccer games, in which three roles are examined: attacker with ball, attacker without ball and defender. 

The actions and the outcome are detailed in table format and will provide you with a potential structure for you own analysis process.

Paper available under the https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This tutorial explains the basics of building an Excel statistical counter. Download the plan in the resource section to help while building your own sheet. 

Understand the main workflows of the Nacsport video analysis software from registering actions, to reviewing video and data then creating presentation resources to share your key findings and messages. Following lectures will teach you these processes in more detail so you can complete the workflow.

How to get your 60-day Nacsport licence

This video will help develop your understanding of a video analysis template and the things that you should think of and consider before you start creating one.

This video will show you how to start creating a buttons template in Nacsport. You will see how to add buttons, move, resize and change the appearance of both the buttons and the template window.

This video will show you how to change the behaviour of your template buttons so you can register all the actions you need. You will also see how to use the template when registering and learn more about the differences between Categories and Descriptors.

When registering actions with your template, you should make use of the Play By Play table to easily check and edit your analysis, either when live capturing or registering from an existing file.

The Matrix tool gives you a quick way to review the relationships between the Categories and Descriptors you have registered, it is a quick overview for some statistics. You can press the numbers in the matrix to watch those specific moments and easily add them to a presentation. In this video, you will see the benefit of opening multiple Databases (timelines) at once as you can review a Matrix for all of these together. You can also export your Matrix to Excel to work with the data there.

The Dashboard tool gives you the most visual and interactive way to see your data and review your analysis. You can create charts and Data Labels to show data based on the Categories and Descriptors in your analysis. You can save a picture of your Dashboard and press charts and Data Labels to watch back the clips relating to them. The Dashboard is useful for quickly building a presentation of key moments too.

The Presentation window is the best tool for picking out your key clips for feedback. You can create different lists and add registers into them from the Timeline, Matrix or Dashboard. Once registers are in a presentation, you can double click them to then edit their lengths, add notes and drawings. This helps you to share your key messages and show your main points.

You can export registers from your Timeline and also export your Presentation (recommended), so you can share your key clips and messages to others.

Unless you decide otherwise, all your Nacsport data will be stored in a folder named “NAC SPORT DATA” by default, which is in the ‘Documents’ folder of your computer. In the following articles, we will try to explain the most important folders within this structure.

We recommend you store the different elements in your analysis in these folders, except videos. By doing so, you will have a better organisation of your work and it will be much easier for sharing too. There are four main folders: 

• Databases Nacsport. This folder contains all the analysis made in Nacsport. It is divided into two other folders. “My DBs” (contains all your analysis) and “Samples” (has different examples we have made for you). Note: Analysis (databases) have the .nac file extension. They do not include videos. 

• Pres. Presentations you create will go into this folder. Note: Presentations have the .pre file extension. However, if you own Basic or Basic Plus, presentations will be associated to your analysis. For this reason, you must share them in the corresponding menu option (picture attached). 

• Categories. The templates you create will go into this folder. There is another folder inside which is named “SampleCat”,with examples for different sports. You can edit and adapt them according to your needs. Note: Buttons templates have the .naccat file extension. 

• Videos. Can be used to store videos. However, our experiences with other users tells us that performance analysts prefer to store their videos on external hard drives to save space, so it’s up to you! These are the four basic folders in the NAC SPORT DATA structure. But not the only ones. Nacsport can create new folders as you start working with new environments in the software (dashboards, matrices, searches, etc.). There are also specific folders depending on which version you are using (Elite has folders Basic does not have). For example, all programs have Dashboards. When you create your first dashboard, then a folder named “Dashboard” will be created inside the structure, containing a single file (dash.board), which contains all of your dashboards. 

Can I change the default folders? Yes, of course. There are two ways of doing this:  Go to the main menu and then press “Tools/Options/Storage folders”. You can select new folders of where to save the different items in your analysis. You can also return to the “default” folders mentioned above.

You can also open this menu window when clicking the Settings icon in the menu you will find in the “My Analysis” section. 

How can the structure be copied? If you want to move your structure to an external hard drive or you want to copy it into another computer, then you must copy all the folders in the NAC SPORT DATA folder, except the CONFIG folder. This one contains exclusive information from your personal computer and can provoke conflicts in the destination computer. 

What happens with my videos? As stated below, analysis, presentations and any other elements in the structure do not contain video. You must copy the videos from their original path and past them in the destination path.  Once you have made this action, you have two options: (a) if the videos are in the same folder that the analysis or presentation file is in, then Nacsport will automatically link the videos to the analysis/presentation or (b) you must link them manually in the “My Analysis” or presentation window environment.  

How can I share templates, analysis and presentations with others? 

The file locations taught above show you where to find files that you can share. When sending a template, you just need to email the .naccat file. When sharing your Database (timeline), you just need to share the .nac file. If the person you are sending to doesn't already have the video that the analysis links to, you will need to send that separately. This is the same case for when sharing a presentation file, as somebody receiving it will need the video files that are linked in the presentation. The presentation file will be a .pre.

For the Nacsport users that are receiving these files, they just need to copy them into their default folder locations for templates, databases and presentations so that they can use and open them.

For more tutorial videos and articles that will help you to utilise the Nacsport features and complete your assignments, you can visit the AnalysisPro Knowledge Base.

In this tutorial we will explore predicting the times an athlete will need to post to be in with a chance of a podium finish. Download the student excel sheet and follow the tutorial to build Mean, Standard Deviation and Confidence Interval Formulas as a good predictor of final mean times from qualify times.