Fever Dream ~ Neymar Jr

Chapter 9

2017

"Okay, let's say you have a corner kick from the left side and you're wondering who should do it and who, from the rest of the players should be positioned where. Remember, this cannot be trusted 100% because the players of the opposite team are variables we cannot account for now, but if you use it in real time during a game you will have some knowledge to make educated guesses about their placement." I told Neymar and David who were sitting on the two sides of me as I showed them 3P v2.

"The other issue here is the input data. This demo right here is still Brazil 2014. I have another version of it where the input is data from literally anywhere I could find it. This means that the result you'll get won't be tailored to a particular team. And I don't think that's going to be as beneficial to teams. So even if this tool was commercial, there would still be the need for some data crunching by the buyer."

"Unless, that is also part of your sales pitch." David said. "That they give you the data, of course you sign whatever it is you need to sign regarding confidentiality, and you hard code it for each version. So, if you sell it to PSG, it would be PSG's version. If you sell it to Lyon, it will be Lyon's, etc."

"That could work, there would need to be updates to it periodically though. Which means an actually customer care department." I commented. "Anyway, so given all that data, the best person to take that corner kick is according to 3P, Thiago. And the best place for Neymar to be is on the opposite side, since you score on average twice as much if you're on the far end of the corner kick than on the near." I told the last bit to Neymar.

He nodded. "This basically takes out the need of analyzing tape upon tape of plays and spits out the result. It's phenomenal." He said.

I knew he couldn't have been that impressed, but he said it for my sake. Besides he had seen the penalty only version of 3P before, this was just an expansion.

"It is." David agreed. "Why hadn't you said you were working on this?" He asked me.

"I wasn't till I came to France. And then, when I started working as a sports scientist for PSG, I kind of started coding this again." I said, getting up from my office chair and going to the living room. The guys followed me.

It was weird to just be three of us together again. It had been years since we did that without me and Neymar being at odds. I don't know what happened, but ever since that day at the parking lot and even though we had not resolved our issues, we had put them to the side.

"But guys, there's an immense amount of work left to be done. And right now, I'm at the last legs of my master's dissertation which I need to finish by September. Let alone that the season is starting next week."

"Maybe you can outsource." David said. "Let's say we found a way to do that. What's the next move? What kind of timeline are we talking about?"

"If I may interject," Neymar started, "I can ask my business manager to look into this."

"That's a great idea." David said before I could speak. "Then Liv can just focus on the technical side of things."

"Hold on, no." I cut him. "It's not so simple. We need seed funding."

David pointed at himself and Neymar excitedly. "We're gonna be rich, baby!" He told me. "And well, you will become rich-er." He told Neymar and then his phone rang. "My mom." He said and went to the next room to speak to her.

Neymar turned to look at me. "I don't want to be an investor Liv. Or a silent partner." Neymar told me. "But I want to give you the capital to get it started. And I don't want it back. I just think this is a great thing and you should do it." He and when he saw me about to protest he added: "But if it makes you feel any better, we can call it a loan. With no interest."