Southampton FC is using technology to boost its fight against relegation from the Premier League.
Saints sit 16th in the table, two points clear of the relegation zone, and are leaving no stone unturned in their quest to beat the drop.
One of the areas in which they are seeking to gain an edge over their rivals is the area of injuries.
Southampton’s sports science and medical department is working with Movement Performance Solutions to help the players fulfil their physical potential as well as to avoid and treat injury.
The firm focuses on ‘health of movement’ to help athletes perform to their best.
It has trained Saints’ staff to use The Performance Matrix (TPM) and Kinetic Control (KC) to reduce risk of injury and enhance performance.
TPM is a reliable online movement assessment, analysis and retraining system. The club have been utilising a sports specific version of this tool – The Football Matrix – as part of their strategy to help reduce the chance of injury for those players identified at increased risk.
Rather than highlighting risk in movement patterns, KC assesses and retrains movement to address the presence of pain, such as identifying when a player is injured.
The club says this has proved particularly successful in addressing hip-related issues and continues to be an integral part of the acute injury management process.
Lincoln Blandford, course tutor and head of education for MPS, said: “It’s been a real privilege to work with such a group of excellent practitioners, who clearly value the role of movement as part of the bigger player support picture.”
Saints’ first-team physio Steve Sparks said: “The Performance Matrix has been an integral part of our pre-season screening for a number of seasons.
“It assists in our injury prevention and performance augmentation strategies, helping us to identify key areas of individual physical development in conjunction with our other screening.
“Through the use of Kinetic Control principles, this screening also helps inform our rehabilitation protocols and planning in order to restore healthy functional synergistic movement patterns.”