14. How do we check whether a new player-data API will integrate with our database?

Question

Accepted Answer

Test identity resolution, data meaning and change handling—not merely whether an API request returns successfully. Wyscout’s documentation exposes provider-specific player identifiers and profile fields; its API reference also documents resources such as players, matches and events. Treat those as inputs to a club-controlled identity system, not an assumed universal identifier. (support.wyscout.com)
Use this Player Data Joinability Check:

Test
Evidence to retain

Identity
Accepted matches, rejected matches, ambiguous cases and reviewer decisions

History
Player-team relationships valid at the match date, not only the current team

Competition mapping
Gender, season, phase and competition identifiers

Semantics
Definitions, units, denominators and missing-value meanings

Geometry and time
Pitch coordinates, attacking direction, periods and timestamp alignment

Updates
Correction, deletion, backfill and schema-change behaviour

Operations
Authentication, rate handling, monitoring and support escalation

Exit
Usable authorised exports and retention/deletion instructions

Maintain a crosswalk with the club ID, provider ID, evidence used to match, review status and mapping version. Avoid automatic name-only acceptance; route uncertain cases to review.
Report matching measures separately:

Automatic-match coverage: automatically accepted records divided by eligible records.
Reviewed precision: correct accepted matches divided by reviewed accepted matches.
Exception workload: unresolved cases and time required to resolve them.

Do not describe a high match rate as high accuracy without reviewing false matches.
Version tests matter. Hudl’s 1 September 2026 Statsbomb release notes document fixes involving competition/season export selection and missing-data displays. Use that as a prompt to test exports against the screen and preserve versions—not as evidence that one provider is uniquely unreliable. (hudl.com)

Test	Evidence to retain
Identity	Accepted matches, rejected matches, ambiguous cases and reviewer decisions
History	Player-team relationships valid at the match date, not only the current team
Competition mapping	Gender, season, phase and competition identifiers
Semantics	Definitions, units, denominators and missing-value meanings
Geometry and time	Pitch coordinates, attacking direction, periods and timestamp alignment
Updates	Correction, deletion, backfill and schema-change behaviour
Operations	Authentication, rate handling, monitoring and support escalation
Exit	Usable authorised exports and retention/deletion instructions

14. How do we check whether a new player-data API will integrate with our database?

Sources cited on this page