The data behind England’s race for World Cup glory

Like most international managers, Gareth Southgate places high physical demands on his players and relies on technology to help him track their efforts throughout the 2022 finals in Qatar

England’s World Cup 2022 players are running more than three kilometres more during games than their 1966 equivalents, and running more than twice as long at top speed, according to a study by STATSports that emphasises just how athletic the modern game has become.

The sports performance data company have been supplying the national team with technology including GPS training vests for over a decade, with Gareth Southgate leaning on them heavily for selection decisions.

STATSports undertook a study where their technology extensively analysed video footage of England’s 4-2 extra-time win over West Germany in the 1966 final.

It was found that Alan Ball had the highest total distance of any England player over the 120 minutes, with 8,550m covered. Phil Foden, one of his equivalents in the current team, by contrast covers an average of 10,620m per 90 minutes. The player who has the highest average total distance is Harry Kane, on 10,999m. Declan Rice however beat that by over a kilometre against Senegal, hitting 12,061m.

In less physically demanding positions, such as centre-half, Bobby Moore covered 7,996m across the two hours against Harry Maguire’s 10,888m in an average 90 minutes.

The gaps are even greater in high-speed running. Ball was also the player to run the fastest for the longest in 1966, at 614m, with that more than doubled by Raheem Sterling in 2022, at 1,331m.

Kane meanwhile runs more than double the distance at speed than his equivalent in Geoff Hurst. England’s 1966 hero covered 606m of high-speed running in that famous match, while Kane manages 1,223m now.

(STATSports)

The point of the study isn’t to dismiss or be disrespectful towards the heroes of 1966, but merely because it is useful in showing how the game has physically transformed with the evolution of sports science.

For context, High Speed Running is the distance that covered over 5.5m/s (19.8km/h). STATSports say it tracks all those lung-bursting runs, overlaps on the wings or tracking back to help out teammates.

Professional players now can tally upwards of 1,100m of HSR during a game, depending on tactics and position played.