Football fans everywhere are gearing up to celebrate the sport’s most skilled athletes as they prepare for the start of another Fifa World Cup. But few get to see how the next generation of Messis and Ronaldos are discovered.

For decades, the beautiful game depended on the human eye: a scout on the sideline, attentively watching, waiting for that something special. That process, however, is becoming increasingly data-driven. Across elite football academies worldwide, technologies such as GPS trackers, automated video analysis, and AI-powered platforms are changing how players are identified and assessed.

In a sport shaped by money and global competition, the appeal is obvious. Clubs want to make better decisions and they want to make them as early as possible. The quicker a talented player is identified, the greater the potential return.

As my research shows, technology promises precisely this. Coaches and scouts are using new tools to make talent identification more efficient and, crucially, more objective. The question is whether talent can actually be reduced to numbers and whether technology and AI combat biases or create new ones.

Modern football increasingly selects players at very young ages. Spanish footballer Lamine Yamal was scouted by Barcelona at just six years old; he made his first-team debut at 15.

This is not a necessarily a new development or consequence of AI and technology. David Beckham famously joined........

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