Transfer Rumours January '22 Transfer Thread

Going to have to agree to disagree on this…what’s reported in newspapers or passed on via social sources is not primary evidence, but as a teacher, you know this.

Pure speculation, TWT

 

Fair enough.

Fair enough.

 

Going off purely numbers has worked pretty well for Brentford

 

They had to spend £10 million on a striker before they went up. It only took them so far. So no they don’t go “purely” off numbers.

 

Sorry but you're talking **** there.

Brentford could only afford to spend £10m on a striker because for years and years they'd kept selling players at major profits which they found by looking at numbers. The reason Brentford are in the PL is because of them looking at numbers.

It didn't only take them so far. In size and stature, they're a L1 club, yet they're sitting 14th in the PL.

Numbers are a far better indication of player's ability than a scout's or manager's POV. Yes, there's things which numbers and statistics can't show, but an individual can be wrong too.

Why do you think pretty much every club uses numbers as the first scouting base? You can analyse a huge database of players and find players in areas which aren't cost effective to scout in the traditional sense.

 

Don’t put words in my mouth. I didn’t say they don’t use data, I just said they don’t sign purely off data. Targets are identified using the data but then they send people to watch them because numbers only tell you half the story.

"We followed him, took a lot of personality references on him, we watched a lot of games and a lot of different people watched him and offered their opinions, and we also look at the data and see what that says about him - so it's been in the making a long time," Rasmus Ankersen Brentford’s Sporting Director.

 

You're both right.

Brentford built up their budget from selling players for eight figure sums and buying cheaply. But at the same time, they used the "Moneyball" method to identify the players they needed to push themselves on. An example is Nico Yennaris (or Li Ke as he is known now that he plays for China). They bought him off Arsenal for relative pittance; he was never going to make the breakthrough for Arsenal and was even mentioned as being "too lightweight" for Brentford's first team. But, he had one of the highest tackling success rates in the U23s league, so when they finally got him going after an injury hit start, he flew in that position and was purchased by Beijing a couple of years ago for a decent fee.

For Brentford, it didn't happen overnight and chairman Matthew Benham was hardly a billionaire. Once they got promoted, they didn't change their model and kept persevering, until they had built a squad that was both gelled and full of quality.

We need to be doing something similar. If we can sell players on for ten times what we buy them for and steadily use that money to build a squad capable of challenging, we'll be golden.

The current methodology around scouting is constantly changing, some use programs, others prefer trusted scout reports to identify players they want. Some even use Football Manager's database (looking at you, Everton and Wimbledon). LD didn't shake things up when he came in, I didn't rate him at first but he's quietly gone about his business and has picked us up some decent players. I still think we could be a little more meticulous in how we look at players, but I'm not going to criticise a set up that's kept us up this season for peanuts.

 

That’s all I meant, fully understand what Shark is saying. They could never quite make the next step until they realised they had to buy ready made players, of course the numbers still played a factor but they were looking at the bread and butter numbers for Toney. I’m a huge fan of how they operate too.

 

This debate started because you said something stupid about Whoscored, which is probably the best free to use stats site there is.

And then followed it up by saying that Brentford only went up because the signed a £10m striker, which was weird too as the squad they had the previous year was undoubtedly stronger.

The biggest question mark at that time was over Thomas Frank and with a more experienced manager they'd probably have been a PL club sooner. But he's improved a lot and done well

 

I definitely read a few years back that we changed to having a much heavier reliance of stats. Although that was due to Ehab being extremely tight and only paying scouts mileage instead of an actual wage. I've no clue if we've reverted back since relegation where our recruitment has improved

 

Possibly, it would be silly not to have a full time scouting team if we are looking to challenge at the top end.

 

You should try
https://fbref.com/en/

 

I didn’t know we didn’t have a full time scouting team? Lee D does it all himself??

 

There's Stuart White who's head scout and a few data analysts who get paid peanuts judging by recent job ads but I'm not sure if there's any more full time ones

 

We were promised several players recruited by the last manager and presumably scouted by LD they would set a division alight. How many of them did so? I accept they were working to a tight budget but our recruitment was not much better when we had more available money

 

Agree, not sure what the structure was at the club at the time. But under Slutsky when we spent a fair bit the recruitment was terrible.

 

We have a full time head of recruitment and a full time head scout, but the others I think aren't paid a salary. That was under the Allams though, I don't know whether Acun has changed this or plans to.

 

It was widely reported. Yes.


But maybe, just maybe now we're gonna put some proper money behind it.

Think about it. He's on schoolboy wages considering he's an U21 international.

How much would it cost us to sign him from another club?

If we're linked wit £2m here and £3m there, do you really think he'll bat an eye at making the kid millionaire over the next couple of years?