Classification of movements of collegiate female soccer players using inertial measurement units

Abstract

This study aimed to classify the movements of female soccer players during matches using raw data measured by inertial measurement units (IMUs). Twelve collegiate female soccer players were equipped with IMUs (100 Hz), and raw triaxial acceleration data from eight official matches were analyzed. The measurement data were separated every 3 s, and a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) was performed. After FFT, the Euclidean distances between the data when the players were in the stationary state and other states were calculated to classify the movements of the players using the k-means method. The data of the clustering numbers classified as the stationary state were eliminated after analyzing the movements of players by video filming the matches. After classification, the average Euclidean distances between the stationary state and other movements were calculated. Consequently, the results showed that the upward and downward directions of the raw data affected the classification. Using the methods of this study, it was also shown that the distribution of Euclidean distances differed from player to player. Our findings indicate that the method used in this study can be used to classify and characterize the movements of female collegiate soccer players.