Football Biomechanics and Performance Enhancement: A Systematic Review

Football players and their coaches are constantly thinking about improving the performance and quality of football for their fans. The purpose of this systematic review was to investigate the use and role of training tools and specialized exercises in enhancing the performance of football players and to review the results, analyses, and suggestions from various studies in the field of football biomechanics and performance enhancement.

Articles were searched through electronic sources in Persian specialized databases: Google Scholar, Magiran, Civilica, Irandoc, SID, ISC and in English databases: Science Direct, Google Scholar, PubMed, and Scopus. The keywords for the search included biomechanics, football, performance enhancement, and their synonyms, which were searched in both Persian and English.

After reviewing the entire text of the articles, a total of 87 articles were evaluated and studied in three areas, including the use of different training tools and exercises to improve performance, as well as the analysis and suggestions resulting from research in football biomechanics and performance improvement.

The findings showed that performance improvement in soccer players is achieved through the use of training tools and specific exercises. Plyometric exercises and theraband stretches improve proprioception and the strength of the ankle joint muscles in soccer players. An increase in technical skills is observed in small-sided games, leading to higher ball possession rates. The FIFA +11 program has a significant impact on the speed, dribbling speed, shot accuracy, agility, and vertical jump of soccer players.