A survey of video-based human action recognition in team sports

Abstract Over the past few decades, numerous studies have focused on identifying and recognizing human actions using machine learning and computer vision techniques. Video-based human action recognition (HAR) aims to detect actions from video sequences automatically. This can cover simple gestures to complex actions involving multiple people interacting with objects. Actions in team sports exhibit a different nature compared to other sports, since they tend to occur at a faster pace and involve more human-human interactions. As a result, research has typically not focused on the challenges of HAR in team sports. This paper comprehensively summarises HAR-related research and applications with specific focus on team sports such as football (soccer), basketball and Australian rules football. Key datasets used for HAR-related team sports research are explored. Finally, common challenges and future work are discussed, and possible research directions identified.