Fabio De Angelis: Mapping the Tactical Evolution of Roma U18

Meet Fabio De Angelis

At just 20 years old and currently serving in his fifth season as a Match Analyst - having spent three years at Italian grassroots mainstay Romulea before joining Frosinone Calcio's youth academy - Fabio De Angelis represents a new wave of analytical talent in modern football. 

Faced with traditional qualification and bureaucratic barriers within the Italian football system, Fabio set out to prove that deep technical expertise and professional standards can be cultivated through passion, study and practical application.

His journey formally started at 17 through SICS, one of Italy's pioneering match analysis education bodies which allowed him to develop a solid methodology which held him in good stead for future projects.

In recent times, he just completed an ambitious independent project to document and analyse the entire 2025/2026 season of AS Roma Under 18 under head coach Mattia Scala, one of Italy's youngest UEFA Pro Licence candidates studying alongside legends such as Franck Ribéry and Samir Handanović. 

In fact, Coach Mattia Scala's recent promotion to Roma's U19 (Primavera) team makes him the youngest head coach in the history of Roma Primavera making him a fascinating subject for Fabio’s project.

What began as a two-month analytical deep dive evolved into a three-month undertaking, culminating in a comprehensive masterwork which has been translated into Italian, Spanish and English.

An Ambitious Study of Mattia Scala

The primary goal of the study was not simply to summarise match scores, but to provide a complete, objective narrative of how Mattia Scala’s football methodology evolved throughout the season. 

By monitoring playing principles, collective tactical behaviors, and individual player maturation - a crucial aspect given Roma’s historic academy reputation for producing elite talents like Riccardo Calafiori, Lorenzo Pellegrini and Davide Frattesi - Fabio created a working model that bridges quantitative performance data with tactical interpretation. 

To accomplish this, he established a collaborative, four-person young analysis team, taking on the role of Project Manager to coordinate responsibilities, standardise tagging methodologies and balance the demanding workload alongside their university studies.

Building a multidisciplinary workgroup allowed Fabio to expand the scope of the project across several specialised tactical areas. 

Michele Suma, a Management Engineering student at Sapienza University of Rome, optimised the operational workflow and helped design the master tagging architecture. 

Mattia Cammillini, a Business Administration student at Sapienza, spearheaded the set-piece analysis to isolate recurring tactical routines and offensive solutions. 

Meanwhile, Nicolò Antonna, studying Physiotherapy at Campus Bio-Medico University of Rome, authored a dedicated technical analysis focused entirely on goalkeeper performance and role-specific demands. 

Together under Fabio's leadership, this student team transformed theoretical knowledge into an elite-level analytical project.

To manage the enormous volume of operational data required for a full-season study, the team relied on Nacsport Elite as the central software engine for the entire project. 

Supported by four Nacsport Elite licences provided directly by the Nacsport team, the group operated across four independent workstations. After obtaining match footage recorded via VEO cameras, Michele and Fabio constructed a bespoke Nacsport button template to systematically tag approximately 20,000 distinct match events across three distinct seasonal phases. 

Nacsport’s intuitive structure enabled the team to efficiently collect, organise and filter tactical metrics before routing data to Excel for structural cleaning, Tableau for interactive KPI and heatmap visualizations, and LIVETAG.PRO for final clip editing. 

This exhaustive study stands as a groundbreaking piece of research in youth football, and readers can explore the complete finished work through the Full Season Case Study (Part 1) and the Supplementary Tactical Analysis (Part 2).

So, now that we’ve explained this fantastic project, let’s talk directly to Fabio about his experience as a working analyst and get more info about how he conducted the study…

Hi Fabio, please introduce yourself.

Fabio De Angelis: My name is Fabio De Angelis. I am 20 years old, a university student, and I currently work as a Match Analyst within the Frosinone Calcio youth academy.

How long have you been in your current role?

Fabio: Although I'm still very young, I've been fortunate to progress quickly in my career. The upcoming season will be my fifth as a Match Analyst. I spent three seasons at Romulea, a grassroots academy that is well known across Italy for its youth tradition. I'm now starting my second season with Frosinone, and I'm excited to continue developing in such a competitive environment.

Please describe a typical week in your sporting life. What are your duties at the club?

Fabio: My experience has always been very hybrid, combining analysis behind the computer with practical work on the pitch. 

As a Match Analyst, my main responsibilities include analysing opponents, reviewing our team's performance on a weekly basis and providing coaches with actionable insights.

Another vital part of my role is working directly with players through individual video analysis sessions. I also lead team video meetings to ensure tactical concepts are communicated clearly. 

Crucially, I support the coaching staff during pitch training exercises. For me, analysis only has real value if video insights can be translated directly onto the field to improve daily performance.

How does video analysis fit into your working week?

Fabio: Video analysis is at the very heart of my working week. I use it every single day. 

However, it is much more than simply reviewing clips; it is a learning tool. The real value comes when the tactical ideas discussed in the video room are transferred onto the training pitch and become natural habits for the players. 

Being involved both behind the laptop and on the pitch ensures that analysis seamlessly connects with session planning.

What setup do you have for your analysis work?

Fabio: For this Roma U18 project, my collaborators and I operated across four independent workstations powered by Nacsport Elite, which formed the backbone of our operational setup.

The most critical phase was designing our tagging workflow. Together with Michele Suma, we explored Nacsport’s advanced capabilities to create a dedicated button template containing all our tactical categories and descriptors. 

Once configured, Nacsport allowed us to systematically tag and process around 20,000 distinct match events across the season.

While we sourced video recorded via VEO cameras and briefly routed structured metrics into Excel and Tableau for customized dashboard visualisations, Nacsport Elite was the indispensable core engine that allowed four analysts to work simultaneously and turn raw footage into structured performance data.

What is your coaching philosophy, and how does video analysis fit into youth development?

Fabio: This specific project was designed to document Coach Mattia Scala’s tactical methodology and provide detailed performance feedback ahead of the playoff phase. 

On a broader level, my goal is to highlight how much room for growth exists in Italian youth academies regarding match analysis.

Introducing structured video analysis at the youth level helps young players build professional habits before reaching senior football. At the same time, having a dedicated analyst frees up coaches to focus on what they do best: planning sessions and developing players on the pitch. 

Video analysis is no longer just an added luxury - it’s an essential element of modern youth development.

What is the structure of your club and how is video analysis utilised across all levels?

Fabio: Frosinone Calcio has a professional structure with a Serie A first team and an academy competing against Italy’s top clubs. 

While Frosinone is not the largest club financially, its investments have established a premier environment for player growth. 

Across Italian youth football as a whole, there is immense potential to expand analysis. With an accessible platform like Nacsport, clubs can implement highly structured analysis workflows across all academy tiers with modest investment.

How do you use Nacsport, and which features made the biggest difference?

Fabio: What impressed me most about Nacsport Elite was its ability to convert complex match video into structured, statistical clarity. 

In youth football, objective performance data is rarely available because manual collection is so time-consuming. Nacsport completely changed that equation for us.

To evaluate Roma U18’s tactical evolution, we used Nacsport to break the season down into three distinct phases:

• Period 1 (September–November): Adapting to Coach Mattia Scala’s playing principles and tactical structure.
• Period 2 (December–January): Managing winter break adjustments and analyzing peak competitive demands.
• Period 3 (February–April): Consolidating tactical behaviors heading into the decisive stretch.

Through Nacsport, we logged around 20,000 events, creating performance statistics and custom KPIs that simply do not exist in Under-18 league coverage. 

Without Nacsport, providing this level of evidence-based feedback would have been impossible.

How do you present your insights to players?

Fabio: We never just send video clips online. Instead, we review them together through interactive discussions. 

During individual sessions, we always ask the player to explain what they see in the clip before giving our own input. Players learn far more effectively when they identify tactical situations and mistakes themselves.

Whether delivering team briefings on collective principles or holding 1-on-1 sessions on individual growth, clear communication is everything. We always tailor the complexity and depth of the analysis to the age and development stage of the player to ensure the message sticks.

Conclusion

Fabio De Angelis and his team have proven that young analysts can deliver top-tier performance analysis when equipped with professional methodology and powerful tools. 

By leveraging Nacsport Elite, they turned thousands of match actions into a clear roadmap for tactical growth - setting an inspiring benchmark for the future of analysis in youth football.

If you have any questions about Fabio’s journey or would like more information about how Nacsport can help you with your own analysis work, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.

Thanks for reading.