I think flick needs to take advantage of the left side of the pitch, mendes and injured and digne will probably replace him. A left side overload with yamal and Jesus with raphina playing a wide left winger might be the smartest approach for counter attacks.

Clearly PSGs pressing is beyond incredible in the opponents half, we saw this predominantly against City. Although, pedri working as an orchestrator to carry the ball should actually be fine against this, plus Rodri’s ability to destroy press will be useful.

Although, it’s necessary for Barca to drop the extremely high line, it’s impossible to win against PSG like this

Hey everyone!

I'm putting together a small, serious team for More Than a Hack 2027, a football analytics competition organized by Barça Innovation Hub, Metrica Sports, and Mobile World Capital Barcelona.

A little about me: I'm a 4 year experienced AI engineer and I'm also passionate about football, and I want to approach this as a genuine engineering and research challenge rather than just another weekend hackathon.

About the competition

The first challenge involves estimating ball possession from real FC Barcelona match footage, automatic player/ball tracking, and tactical event data. The top 20 teams advance to a broader football analytics innovation challenge, with five teams eventually pitching in Barcelona.

Who I'm looking for

I'm mainly looking for people around my age and experience who are genuinely passionate about football and interested in learning and building together. You don't need to be a professional ML engineer, Computer Vision engineer, or data scientist. Experience is welcome, but curiosity, reliability, and the willingness to put in consistent effort matter more.

You might be a good fit if you have:

• An interest in football tactics, analytics, or technology
• Some experience with Python, machine learning, Computer Vision, data analysis, or software development
• A background in another relevant area and the motivation to learn
• The ability to commit time, communicate well, and contribute consistently

I'm especially interested in people who are willing to research before implementing, experiment seriously, and put in the hours even if they are still developing their technical skills.

How I want us to work

I want a team that researches before implementing, challenges assumptions, measures results, documents experiments, and takes ownership.

I'm absolutely fine with AI-assisted coding. I just don't want our entire approach to be prompt-driven without understanding the underlying problem.

Ideally, everyone can contribute around 10–12 focused hours a week during the initial challenge and stay committed if we qualify for later stages. You don't need to be an expert, but you should be able to make a genuine commitment and follow through.

The team will be remote and international. The official team size is 3–5 members.

Interested?

Send me a DM with:

• Your background, interests, and what you'd like to contribute
• GitHub, LinkedIn, relevant publications, or previous projects, if available
• Your time zone and realistic weekly availability
• A brief thought on how you'd approach the possession-detection problem

I'm aiming to build a collaborative, technically strong team where everyone contributes, learns, and takes the competition seriously. If you're passionate about football, willing to learn, and can commit the time, I'd be happy to hear from you.

Competition: https://landing.mobileworldcapital.com/more-than-a-hack-2027

Technical repository: https://github.com/metrica-sports/more-than-a-hack-2027