Soccer

Imagine having a coach in your soccer ball. That's essentially what InsideCoach says it has done, by creating a smart soccer ball that can monitor a player's skills, track progress, provide tips on how to improve, and make practice more interesting.

Adidas has done away with a staple of most covered footwear and launched a laceless football boot that's to be worn in-game by some of the world's top players this weekend.

Scientists at MIT and the Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI) have leveraged videogame technology to generate broadcast quality 3D video of soccer matches from a 2D source in real time.

A new 300,000 LED façade has been installed at the Allianz Arena, home of soccer powerhouse Bayern Munich. The façade is wrapped around the entire outside of the 71,137-capacity stadium, covering an area of of 26,000 sq m, and will be used to create dynamic and colorful light displays.

The new game of Teqball arches the ping pong table's back, pulls out the paddles and challenges players to put their football skills to work. Designed by a UK-based start-up company with international roots, it's part football training tool, part competitive table game and part hybrid sport.

Two new studies from Disney Research show the power of deep data analysis in sports. One resulted in a model that accurately predicts whether a basketball player will pass or shoot in a given situation, while the other identifies player roles in soccer from the context of each moment.

Balls made for organized sports are designed to be used at a specific hardness, which is why the TorrX was invented. It's a portable electric pump, that automatically inflates or deflates a ball in order to reach a given pressure.

With the Al Wakrah and Al Bayt stadium designs already announced, a third design has now been unveiled for use at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. The existing Khalifa International Stadium will be renovated to bring it up to current FIFA standards, and also have air cooling features fitted.

Kinetic tile company Pavegen has partnered with Shell for its biggest undertaken so far – to give a run-down community soccer field in a Rio de Janeiro favela an off-grid power supply which benefits the whole community.

The World Cup may have finished a few weeks ago, but there was another one played in Brazil just last week. The annual RoboCup competition was held in João Pessoa, including the robot soccer World Cup.

The FIFA 2014 World Cup in Brazil will be kicked off by a paralyzed person using a brain-controlled robotic exoskeleton. This feat is being carried out as a demonstration of the current state-of-the art in assisted mobility technology.

Building technology into a round ball appears an emerging trend. Just as the globe turns its focus to next month's World Cup, Adidas is unveiling its miCoach Smart Ball with built-in sensors to track everything from the power of your strike to the finesse of your free kick.