technology, World Cup, soccer, baseball, basketball, hockey

https://www.reporterherald.com/2026/06/21/how-is-technology-changing-the-world-cup-dave-taylor/

Publish Date: 2026-06-21 10:40:00

Q: I’ve been watching World Cup games and heard a commentator mention something about sensors and tracking technology in the soccer ball. How does that work? Do any other sports use smart embedded sensors to monitor games?

A: The World Cup ball, known as the “Trionda,” may get most of the attention, but it’s really just one part of a much larger story. Modern sports have become some of the world’s most sophisticated data collection operations.

Dave Taylor / Technology

If you’ve been watching World Cup matches, you’ve heard commentators talk about player speed, distance covered, and possession percentages. What might surprise people is that those aren’t estimates, they’re measurements generated by a remarkable network of cameras, computers, and tracking systems.

In soccer, an array of cameras mounted around the stadium continuously monitor every player’s position on the field. The official match ball contains a tiny sensor that helps determine the precise instant it is kicked (not its location). Combined with some slick software, officials can determine whether a player was offside with a level of accuracy that would have seemed impossible just a few years ago.

Sensors and tracking across sports

Soccer isn’t unique in this regard, however. Almost all major sports now use sensors. NFL players have RFID tracking chips tucked into their shoulder pads. These sensors allow the league to track location and calculate speed, acceleration, distance traveled, and even how much separation a receiver creates from a defender. That’s how an announcer can state that a running back hit 22 mph on a touchdown run.

Major League Baseball may be even more obsessed with data and numbers. The Statcast system tracks every pitch and every hit. Teams know the speed of the ball leaving the bat, the angle at which it launched, the spin rate of a pitch, and how quickly a fielder reacted to a line drive. Modern baseball analysis is built on data that simply didn’t…

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