Game Plan. The New Football Matrix

English sample translation available

The future of football begins now!

International football is undergoing a tremendous change right now: Mathematical analyses are changing our understanding of the game, data-based scouting is changing how teams are put together and clubs are adopting systematic strategies. There’s been talk of digital processes in football for a long time already, but the big technological revolution is only just beginning. Football is going to be revolutionized in ways we can’t begin to imagine today. Playing on grass will be affected, as will the scouting of pros, the strategies clubs use and how the media reports on the sport.

This new race in the international football industry is also one between the majors and their flush coffers and the outsiders, geeks or rule-breakers who are providing surprising and fresh impetus to football with their own ideas. To keep up in this race you need a game plan – and not just for the next match. Christoph Biermann set off to explore these disruptive transformations, talking to scientists, trainers, managers, scouts and psychologists in the major German clubs and traveling to England, Holland, Denmark and the USA, completely rediscovering today’s football. A revelation for all football fans.

“A book full of thrilling ideas and inside views on what we know about football today. The most exciting book in an exciting time of football.” - Thomas Hitzlsperger

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Sample Translations
Sample Translations
Rights sold to

France: Hachette / Great Britain (English world rights): Blink Publishing / Hungary: Jaffa / Poland: WSQN 

  • Publisher: KiWi-Paperback
  • Release: 12.04.2018
  • ISBN: 978-3-462-05100-1
  • 288 Pages
  • Author: Christoph Biermann
Game Plan. The New Football Matrix
Christoph Biermann Game Plan. The New Football Matrix
Norman Posselt
© Norman Posselt
Christoph Biermann

Christoph Biermann , born in Krefeld in 1960, lives in Berlin and has worked for taz , Stern , and Die Zeit , and served as an editor at Süddeutsche Zeitung and SPIEGEL . Since 2010, he has been working for the soccer magazine 11Freunde , currently as a reporter. Three of his many books have been named “Football Book of the Year”: Die Fußball-Matrix (2010), Wenn wir vom Fußball träumen (2015), and Um jeden Preis (2023). His books have been published in several languages.