Since forever, coaches of national teams and football teams have often had spies to film and study their opponents, as a way of creating tactics to overcome them in the confrontation.
From this edition of the World Cup onwards, this spying will no longer be necessary, as FIFA itself will make information on all 48 teams available to all technical committees.
Created by partner Lenovo, Fifa AI Pro is an artificial intelligence tool that was trained within the scope of football and will provide videos, player scouts and analyzes on defense positioning, the characteristics of defenders and the main attacking moves of each team.
The platform even allows analysts to compare a team’s patterns through video clips that use 3D avatars of the athletes, bringing the data to life in real time.
Thus, instead of analyzing a spreadsheet with information that describes an opponent’s characteristic, the coach will be able to observe the avatars acting on a virtual pitch according to the data.
The purpose of this tool, according to Valério Mateus, general manager of Services and Solutions in Latin America at Lenovo, is to provide the same working conditions for all teams competing in the World Cup, as the most powerful federations already have such a structure, while the smaller ones have little purchasing power to finance the solution.
“For each player, for each tactic, there is a mountain of information. So, larger teams have many analysts who chew this information almost manually, or with few tools, and transform it into input for the coach to evaluate tactics, the other team’s plays, what he needs to do. A smaller team has fewer analysts to consume the same mountain of data. So, there is a disparity there”, says Mateus.
The manager highlights that all the information that will be disclosed is public, that anyone would have access to. “The tool is the same for everyone and the processing capacity of this information is gigantic, much greater than having a small army of analysts.”
Technical committees will have free access to Fifa AI Pro before and after the games. During duels, the tool will not be available.
“This is a determination by FIFA. It [técnico] you can use it beforehand to prepare, you can use it afterward to evaluate what happened during the match. And then, obviously, prepare for the next one. It’s a tool for coaches”, says Mateus, making it clear that it will not replace the players’ talent, but will level up the teams’ ability to prepare for games.
Built with Lenovo’s AI Factory, the system is the result of 18 months of intensive development, including 16 months dedicated exclusively to algorithm training.
According to the company, performance is guaranteed by the exclusive use of FIFA’s structured data history, accumulated over decades of elite competitions. And with each game, the tool will be updated with the respective data.
“With FIFA AI Pro, we will democratize access to data by providing the most complete set of football analytics for all competing teams and fans alike. But, of course, this is just the beginning,” highlights FIFA President Gianni Infantino.
In addition to the technical committees, some fans will also have the opportunity to access FIFA AI Pro data, but only those who attend the VIP areas set up by Lenovo in the World Cup stadiums to publicize this and other innovations used in the competition.
The opening of the 2026 World Cup will take place from 2:30 pm (Brasília time) this Thursday (11), at the Azteca stadium, in Mexico City. After the party, the home team will play the opening game of Group A against South Africa, at 4pm (Brasília time).
In the same group, South Korea faces the Czech Republic at 11pm (Brasília time).
