"Elite Sports: Challenges of Data collection and information extraction"

Abstract

This work's overall objective is to highlight the difficulties that arise when working with data in the present time and with nowadays tools through the analysis of elite sports data. In particular, this dissertation's purpose is two-fold. Firstly, we aim to perform a trend analysis in salary increases for two of the most practiced and popular sports in history - Basketball and Tennis - to identify possible gender differences in these growths, or other relevant insights. Secondly, we aim to explain in detail the process we have gone through in building and refining the data set for our analysis with a particular focus on the challenges and questions that subsequently arose from this process. Taking into consideration data from the American female and male basketball leagues, respectively the WNBA and NBA, we perform a statistical analysis intending to find possible and meaningful differences in how player's wages increased over time. We also perform a similar analysis for the singles winners' prizes of the four Grand Slams in the calendar year.