Podcasts by Forza Futbol

On my recent trip to  the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston, I got a chance to sit down and chat with Alexi Lalas, former player of USMNT, GM of LA Galaxy and a senior analyst for Soccer at ESPN. Alexi was also on the increasingly popular Soccer panel at the SSAC.

We chatted about the MLS, the recent win of US over Italy, the upcoming Euro 2012, SPain's chances and some La Liga topics. Enjoy the great insights of Alexi. You may give him feedback directly at @AlexiLalas or  leave a comment here.

Forzafutbol thanks Alexi for spending time to do this interview.

Duration - 20 min

Agenda

1. Growth of MLS in the past 10 years 2. Can you compare the usage of analytics during your playing career to nowadays? 3. What is the best way to bridge the gap between how the coaches scheme & gameplan for games and the numbers and stats that the analytics geeks produce? 4. Favorite team outside of US? 5. Who are you rooting for in Euro 2012 6. Do you watch spanish football? 7. if yes, which is your favorite 8. What do you think La Liga needs to do get the better audience in the US? 9. Cristano vs Messi 10. Real Madrid vs Barça 11. Mourinho vs Pep Guardiola

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[caption id="attachment_33113" align="aligncenter" width="303" caption="La Liga talk with Eduardo Alvarez of ESPNSoccernet.com"] [/caption]

We welcome back Eduardo Alvarez of ESPNSoccernet.com to do a La Liga round-up, the transfer window happenings and much more. Eduardo writes the weekly quiniela column on ESPNSoccernet.com and contributes for Radio Marca of Spain and blogs for Esporte Interativo of Brasil. You may follow the "only trilingual spanish football commentator" on Twitter at @EdAlvarezSpain

Agenda :

0. Transfer window deals - best & worst 1. The state of La Liga. Do you feel the league is less competitive? Why? 2. The race for 3rd and 4th. Are Valencia, Athletic, Atletico and Malaga Champions League material? 3. What do you think will happen at Zaragoza? 4. The story of Mirandes 5. Are you surprised by Barça's away form and why? 6. Do you think Mou will stay another year at Madrid? 7. Who is the most improved player for you this year? 8. Who is the revelation of the year? 9. How are you Quinela predictions coming along?

And a lot more interesting stuff.

Thanks

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Elisa and Ravi talked to Javier Hernandez aka @JavierJotah of Madrid, the La Liga stats analyst for Whoscored.com. We talked about how Javier got into stats and various questions around La Liga stats.

Duration 55 min

1. How did you get into stats?

2. Which stats are intrinsic to La Liga

3. Impact of Barça & Madrid's numbers on overall stats of La Liga

4. How do you differentitate between good stats and manipulated stats?

5. How and where do you get your data from?

6. Whar are thats stats you look at to rate GKs, defenders. midfielders and strikers?

7. Why is rating midfielders so hard?

8. Who is the best crosser in La Liga (you will be surprised by the answer.)

9. Do Premier League teams rely more on stats analysis than La Liga teams?

10. MediaPro has its own package called MediaCoach which they are trying to make all teams use it

11. Coaches tapes

12. Best performers of La Liga - GKs, defenders, midfielders, strikers

13. La Liga talk & predictions

7.

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