Milan Lab

Milan Lab's secret of youth Financial Times 29-Feb-2008 By Simon Kuper AC Milan's very old men are sauntering around a training pitch in the hills near Lake Como. A grey man in a blue suit and blue trenchcoat gazes down at them, smoking a cigarette. Surely this smoker can't be the head of football's best medical team? But it is. Jean Pierre Meersseman, Belgian director of the Milan Lab, may have discovered the secret of eternal youth. His Lab has helped make Milan world and European champions. On Tuesday, in the Champions League's second round, Milan defend their title against Arsenal's kids. "As a matter of fact," chuckles Meersseman when we sit down, "yesterday we had a game, and the average age was 33. We have the oldest team in Europe." He singles out Milan's eternal captain, Paolo Maldini. "He's close to being 40, and whenever he was running against that kid playing against him yesterday, he was much stronger. He's close to perfect." What is the maximum age for a top-class footballer? "I think around 40. It used to be 34 at most." Again, that soft chuckle. The Milan Lab began in 2002. Milan had just spent 30m in transfer fees and salary to sign Real Madrid's Fernando Redondo. Redondo's body appeared perfect. Then it collapsed. Milan resolved never to waste 30m

again. The Lab was created to reduce injuries. "If you can predict the possibility of injuries," says Meersseman, "you stop the player before." The Lab discovered that just by studying a player's jump, it could predict with 70 per cent accuracy whether he would get injured. It went on from there, collecting millions of data on each player on computers. Meersseman says: "The extent of non-traumatic injuries has been reduced by over 90 per cent, compared with the previous five years. So that's interesting. We have 92 per cent less medication than in the previous years." Sadly, days after we spoke, Milan's forward Ronaldo suffered the injury that may end his career. When Milan buys players, is the Lab consulted? "You bet you," says Meersseman. "The last signature on the contract before the big boss signs is mine. On many occasions I said no, and I would say every" - he pauses - "yes, every time, the player did not do very well afterwards." Why might he veto a player? "Basically alterations in their gait mechanisms, how they jump. But we did sign some players when everybody said: 'You can't do it, he's at the very end.' I can give you a name: Cafu. That was five years ago. He's still here. Because we saw the problem could be fixed." Having vanquished injuries, the Lab turned to perfecting Milan's players. As each player was different, each needed a different regime. Clarence Seedorf, for instance, was banned from exercising certain muscles as they were already at the desired maximum. The Lab now thinks this "sensory perception" is the key quality in football. After meeting Meersseman I visited Daniele Tognaccini, Milan's chief athletics coach, who is tall, slim and fairly superhuman himself. Tognaccini told me that the average Milan player ran 10 to 11 kilometres a game.

Who ran most? Kak, Rino Gattuso and Cafu, replied Tognaccini. He laughed: "Ronaldo, no." But, he added, there was no correlation between running kilometres and winning matches. "There is a correlation between the number of sprints and winning." Before leaving the Lab converted, I asked Meersseman whether other big clubs did anything similar. "No." Why not? It seems a good idea. Meersseman smiled: "It seems a good idea. You can drive a car without a dashboard, without any information, and that's what's happening in soccer. There are excellent drivers, excellent cars, but if you have your dashboard, it just makes it easier. I wonder why people don't want more information." Did other clubs ask him for advice? "Oh yes." And what did he say? "That they should do it." The Lab's methods are secret. Ask Tognaccini to explain a certain machine, and he says: "No." Other clubs, said Meersseman, "fall back into the medical model. You see, that's the problem. In medicine you are dealing with sickness. Here we are dealing with extremely healthy people." And the Lab has only just started. Its new partner Microsoft is improving the Lab's software. Belgium's University of Leuven is helping to perfect training. "Let me stop for a second and explain this better," said Meersseman. "We are trying to make a system that may say: 'Now you will run 100 metres. You will rest 43 seconds, then run 80 metres, stop for one minute two seconds, and then run 61 metres.' We are trying to do this with predictive algorithms." Forget sharing information with other clubs. If the Lab sold its secrets to the world's consumers, it would render face-lifts and wrinkle creams defunct. This could be the salvation of Italy's economy.