Bibliometric analysis of global football research

ABSTRACTObjectives: As a researcher in the field of football, the primary challenge is to retrieve the required information quickly, scientifically, and accurately from a large number of articles. With this in mind, this study aims to summarise the scientific results of global football sports research in WoSCC, explore research frontiers, identify collaborative networks, track research trends, and highlight emerging hotspots.Methods: Relevant original publications were downloaded from the Web of Science Core Collection database (WoSCC). Bibliometric visualization and comparative analysis of authors, cited authors, journals, co-cited journals, institutions, countries, references, and keywords were systematically carried out using CiteSpace software.Conclusions: A total of 15,410 articles met the search criteria, with a general upward trend in annual publication volume, but with some fluctuations. The United States and Liverpool John Moores Univ are the top producing countries and institutions, with most publications concentrated in journals in sports science, social science, psychology, general internal medicine, and behavioral science. The results show that the current hot spots in global football research are mainly "performance analysis", "sports monitoring", "sports injuries" and "talent identification". The leading thematic areas of research are "recreational football and public health", "fitness training and measurement evaluation", "match monitoring and event statistics", and "longitudinal review studies and systematic reviews", which may receive more attention in the future.