The Wisynco Group yesterday signed a formal agreement with the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) for the financing of InStat Sport data program with the hope of enhancing the Reggae Boyz’ chances of qualifying for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia.

InStat provides football analysis on players and countries’ performances and is used by more than 800 clubs and countries worldwide. Francois Chalifour, director of marketing at Wisynco Group, presented the symbolic key to the database to Head Coach Winfried Schaefer at the JFF headquarters in New Kingston.

“With statistics in today’s world, how can you ever live without them?” asked Chalifour rhetorically.

“Going back to 15-20 years, perhaps the use of video and other footage might not have been widely used. However, now with the technology that exists it’s impossible to reach that level of competitiveness that the Reggae Boyz need to have and to reach for, without the help of data that I am sure our competitors have and if we don’t have the same data that they have, we are always starting at a disadvantage,” he noted.

“So, we at Wisynco and Wata are very happy to be supporting the team with this data. We are, as we have been for many years, continuing to support the Reggae Boyz and are really behind them 100 per cent,” said Chalifour.

Janice Rose Brown, director of operations, public relations and events at the JFF, said the information will be provided to the football federation through the senior team coach for all World Cup qualifiers and it will also impact on the Copa tournament and beyond.

“We have moved into a new stage and we are hoping in fact, that as the Boyz progress to the final stage at the end of this year to next year, the agreement will be renewed with Wisynco and they will have access to it for another period of time,” said Rose Brown.

The JFF technical staff had access to InStat at last year’s Copa and Head Coach Schaefer and Team Manager Roy Simpson believed it helped a lot.

“It’s fantastic. Many times we talk about what we need for our national team. It is very important for us. It is good for us, good for Jamaica and I hope it makes success against Costa Rica,” said Schaefer.

The German pointed out how InStat helped left back Kemar Lawrence in his battle against the world’s best player Lionel Messi when Jamaica played Argentina.

“It showed how Kemar Lawrence can stop Messi and he (Lawrence) was in the team of the tournament. Believe me, it is so important,” Schaefer emphasised.

Simpson outlined how InStat has impacted the performances of the Reggae Boyz over the last year. “We took on the special software program InStat which we used to scout our opponents and to get the kind of data we need on players. It is used in twofolds; we use it to follow our players at the international level at their clubs and for Jamaica and we also use it to scout our opponents,” he explained.

“We are happy when we heard that Wisynco will be making this program available to us,” Simpson added.