A lot of the Milk Cup success comes down to the preparation and hard work of the staff.
One area of this is the video analysis that aids the players' development and motivation.
The video analysis involves the games being videoed with the use of a Hi-Pod. T
he equipment acts as a tripod and allows the camera to film the action from 30 feet high.
The camera is linked to a laptop which receives the video feed of the game and allows analyst Luke Stopforth to record the action as it happens.
After the game is when the real work starts for Luke.
Due to the nature of the Milk Cup, where games are being played every day, matches are played over 60 minutes in the Junior competition.
It takes Luke five hours to analyse a sixty minute contest and seven to eight hours for a ninty minute match.
The software is set-up to code passages of play such as good attacking, bad attacking, goals scored, goals conceded, good defending or bad defending.
By recording this information, Head Coach Danny Buck and Technical Coach Stuart English have a range of statistics which the software records which includes reports on Action Areas, Passing Analysis, Regaining Possession, Challenges and Shooting.
Below is a diagram of the statistics that Luke captured from yesterday's game against Everton.
The diagram below shows the number of passes attempted and completed.
Buck and English talk through the footage to the players about the positives and negatives from each game.
After the footage they set the players team activity tasks.
The players are grouped into their positions and they are asked to come up with the positives and negatives.
Each group comes up with a number of things and this is reinforce their learning so they can remember and take this onto the pitch.
Hopefully this will give the Brentford players an edge over Liverpool tonight.
Kickoff is at 7.30pm and you can keep track of the half time and full time score via the Brentford Twitter account.
A full match report will appear on www.brentfordfc.co.uk later tonight.
Robert Trand
