{"id":1278,"date":"2019-02-18T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-02-18T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/reports\/how-manchester-city-translate-data-into-meaningful-interventions\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T05:12:37","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T05:12:37","slug":"nick-chadd","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/nick-chadd\/","title":{"rendered":"How Manchester City Translate Data into Meaningful Interventions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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\n Feb 18, 2019 <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>Articles<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

How Manchester City Translate Data into Meaningful Interventions<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n \n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Category<\/div>\n Data & Innovation<\/a>, Human Performance<\/a> <\/div>\n
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Nick Chadd, Head of Sport Science at the Manchester City Academy, says that it must come down to the person doing the interpreting.<\/p>\n \n \n \n

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\u201cData is great but it can also be difficult to interpret and understand,\u201d says Nick Chadd.<\/h4>\n
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By John Portch<\/h6>\n

The Manchester City Academy\u2019s Head of Sports Science oversees the data collection of nine teams, from Under-9 through to the Under-23s. That means 200 players and nine different head coaches trying to make sense of the numbers in front of them.<\/p>\n

Chadd continues: \u201cWe can all put the same set of data in front of everybody but it comes down to the person interpreting that and then translating that into what I would call meaningful interventions.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things I\u2019m big on is making our data live because there\u2019s no point in collecting all this data, having it sitting in a databank and it not informing anything or not living.\u201d<\/p>\n

So how does data \u2018live\u2019 at Manchester City and how is its use evolving over time? Chadd, who has been at City since 2016, tells the Leaders Performance Institute that it remains a case of data informing coach intuition, integrating players into your process, and adopting a fully aligned approach across all coaches at the Academy.<\/p>\n

How are you making the most of the data you collect?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NC:<\/strong> The strategy that we have put in place is to scale our data collection accordingly. By that I mean we collect less data at certain levels and more data at certain levels depending on the way that we\u2019re resourced and also dependent on some of the key time points in an athlete\u2019s development and as they get closer to being a professional footballer. From that perspective, we tend to collect less data at younger ages and collect more data as they get older and ensure we have a set of comprehensive data to make decisions.<\/p>\n

Are you using data better these days that say a year or two ago?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NC:<\/strong> I hope so! I think we\u2019ve put some systems in place that ensure we use the data. For example, we have regular reviews, which isn\u2019t ground-breaking by any stretch of the imagination but we have regular six-weekly training reviews across four different teams. The data that comes out of those reviews is aligned so that we can compare between teams as well. One of the biggest challenges I find is aligning our system across multiple teams to ensure that the athlete is getting a progressive and continual pathway and they\u2019re not chopping and changing the pathway as they go from one set of coaches and practitioners to another. It\u2019s really important to me that they have an experience that is progressively challenging but all in line with the methodology we\u2019re trying to put in place.<\/p>\n

Processes evolve over time but are you able to complement historical datasets with the current?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NC:<\/strong> We do and that comes down to having a really robust data collection system in place and being tight and stringent on that regardless of a new coach or a new practitioner coming in. They have to follow this process tightly and stringently because we need the data they collect to be comparable.<\/p>\n

To what extent is data used to support intuition? Where is the balance between gut and what the numbers say?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NC:<\/strong> A lot of my data conversations start with the sentence \u2018we already know this but this confirms what we\u2019re thinking\u2019. That\u2019s not a bad notion because that means we\u2019ve got people with this skill for picking up certain things; every now and again the data will throw up something that maybe someone hasn\u2019t picked up or something that someone highlighted or just sometimes just having the opportunity to step back and have that helicopter view; as we know when you get into the day to day task you can sometimes miss the bigger picture and that\u2019s where the data can come into play as well.<\/p>\n