Robots playing soccer at this year's RoboCup is like watching toddlers learn to kick

Perhaps in the not-too-distant future, the World Cup may be won by small, adorable robots — ones that have already embarked on a rigorous athletic training at this year's RoboCup 2015 competition held in Hefei, China.

The 19th annual event held this week brought engineers, professors and students from all over the world to participate in a competition aimed to encourage the development and research of small humanoid robots. Maybe, one day, they'll be athletic enough to beat a team of World Cup champions.

In the clip above, you'll notice the robots have a long way to go. It's quite hard for them to stand upright and they tumble often, mostly because of the fluctuating playing surface, which varies from carpet to astroturf. But the potential for these robots to play in a real soccer match in the future is evident. They can run, kick and sense when the ball is near Read more...