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Recruitment Team?


Ramarena

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After getting onto this in a debate with @Ambitious it got me thinking more about what is going on at the club in this area and how little we/me know(s) about it. 

So I thought I start a thread to see if anyone knows what goes on? Do we still have a recruitment team like we did in the Rush era. Does the manager have more input these days? What are we targeting and why, who gives scouts the parameters and who makes the final decisions? 

Aside from the loans last season and Beilik and Shinnie this, our signings just seem so random (Josefzoon) or often just plain poor (Dowell) in recent years and I wonder if anyone has any insight into what happens in this area of the club?

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I don’t think the recruitment itself has been bad since 15/16, which was a shambles.

Pearson signed players for a 442. His appointment was a shambles but we signed towards a 442 and you can see how Anya, Vydra and Wilson would have worked down the line. 

Mac 2 tried to get us playing football again. Nugent could link-up play, De Sart was a bit crap but you can see the theory. The team was broken by this point. 

Rowett signed older players because they were cheap and we could effectively change system in a summer. 

Under Lampard, the biggest question is why Marriott AND Waghorn. 

We didn’t even have a manager by the time pre-season had started so you can’t blame the recruitment team for not identifying players when we didn’t even know what system. 

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Its all very hush hush which is strange for a club that likes to communicate openly with fans (unless its about selling the ground, or such stuff that we just shouldn't know about). 

Its basically a top secret facility. If you open the wrong door at Moor Farm you might accidentally chance upon the outer sanctum of a very sophisticated operation. I was told by someone who did this that there were audible gasps, and the door was very quickly closed again.

He saw just enough to give a few clues. There was a large darkened room full of computers and vdu's.There were videos and editing facilities and lots of blind people all sticking pins in random lists of player names. Another team were decyphering clues from the patterns of bat droppings. There was even a mad woman just shouting out random names. I believe it was her who came up with Bradley Johnson and Abdul Camara. 

No-one is allowed in and no-one is allowed out. I was told that joe mcclaren just wandered in by mistake, and hasn't been seen for years.

 

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8 minutes ago, Nuwtfly said:

I've edited that post because It's not fair of me to assume that he's not qualified to be in that position. He might be the best person on the team for all I know. 

I would openly question how qualified our team is as a whole though. Our track record has been really poor.

Isn't the 'emerging talent' our best recruiting? Is that the U18s & U23s or is that someone else?

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Just now, RoyMac5 said:

Isn't the 'emerging talent' our best recruiting? Is that the U18s & U23s or is that someone else?

I think you're right - which has arguably been our strongest area of recruitment. Hector-Ingram a very good example of this. 

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34 minutes ago, Nuwtfly said:

I have a question.

How qualified are the people in our recruitment team to do their roles?

Head of Senior Scouting & Emerging Talent Development - Joe McClaren

Head of Technical Scouting - Jon Howard

Head of Emerging Talent Recruitment - Harry Croft

Head of Academy Recruitment - Chris Perkins

Head of Local Recruitment - Jamie Smith

Considering the latter 3 relate to the academy, I think their success is more important than how ‘qualified’ they are. The other two though...?

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1 hour ago, Nuwtfly said:

I have a question.

How qualified are the people in our recruitment team to do their roles?

Head of Senior Scouting & Emerging Talent Development - Joe McClaren

Head of Technical Scouting - Jon Howard

Head of Emerging Talent Recruitment - Harry Croft

Head of Academy Recruitment - Chris Perkins

Head of Local Recruitment - Jamie Smith

I'm surprised to see Joe McClaren still here. I remember him joining but assumed he's left when his dad did....even more surprised to see him heading the whole show. 

After a quick bit of research he came in as head of U21 scouting during Chris Evans short reign, but clearly stayed on and has risen up the ranks to be head honcho, so he must be doing something right!

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Our recruitment has been abysmal for years, it genuinely sickens me to think of all the millions that have been chucked away by the club, a lot of that was during the Sam Rush days, but it really is a ridiculous amount.

The whole recruitment set up is a joke (from my limited knowledge), first we hired Chris Evans, then we let him go, then we recruited him again and I assume he has gone again? 

We clearly dont scout abroad, we continuously find ourselves linked with overpriced championship players that we have no chance of signing and were constantly pipped to by the likes of Aston Villa.

Antonio, Kodija, Da Laet, Lansbury, Assombolonga, James Chester, Tyrone Mings, Connor Hourihane, Glenn Whelan, Adomah, jota, John McGinn etc etc etc

Meanwhile, Brentford and even Peterborough continue to find player after player that they bring in, nurture and sell for millions...I'd rather be doing that than trying to get promotion, at least we would be seeing the likes of Marriott scoring 30 goals, Watkins bagging 20 goals or Ivan Tony this season banging them in.

Our recruitment needs a shake up from the ground up and Mr Cocu should be the man to sort it!

 

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Head of Academy Recruitment - Chris Perkins

This chap recruited Jason knight so he should win the large cauliflower which is presented each year to the best scout.

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The biggest failing of our scouting network is the sheer inability to scout outside of England and Scotland. A club of our size should be able to pick up a gem from abroad (proper scouting - not like Camara and Albentosa).

I think scouting is the biggest issue we currently have at the club, you could argue in recent years only Holmes was unearthed as a hidden gem.

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13 minutes ago, MackworthRamIsGod said:

Our recruitment has been abysmal for years, it genuinely sickens me to think of all the millions that have been chucked away by the club, a lot of that was during the Sam Rush days, but it really is a ridiculous amount.

The whole recruitment set up is a joke (from my limited knowledge), first we hired Chris Evans, then we let him go, then we recruited him again and I assume he has gone again? 

We clearly dont scout abroad, we continuously find ourselves linked with overpriced championship players that we have no chance of signing and were constantly pipped to by the likes of Aston Villa.

Antonio, Kodija, Da Laet, Lansbury, Assombolonga, James Chester, Tyrone Mings, Connor Hourihane, Glenn Whelan, Adomah, jota, John McGinn etc etc etc

Meanwhile, Brentford and even Peterborough continue to find player after player that they bring in, nurture and sell for millions...I'd rather be doing that than trying to get promotion, at least we would be seeing the likes of Marriott scoring 30 goals, Watkins bagging 20 goals or Ivan Tony this season banging them in.

Our recruitment needs a shake up from the ground up and Mr Cocu should be the man to sort it!

 

You missed off that list Ivan Ardon who I’m glad we didn’t get because apparently he was a bit stuck up. 

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1 hour ago, Sean said:

The biggest failing of our scouting network is the sheer inability to scout outside of England and Scotland. A club of our size should be able to pick up a gem from abroad (proper scouting - not like Camara and Albentosa).

I think scouting is the biggest issue we currently have at the club, you could argue in recent years only Holmes was unearthed as a hidden gem.

We obviously saw Brexit (if it ever happens) coming years ago and realised there wouldn’t be much point putting any effort into scouting foreign players until we could recruit internationals when we reach the holy land of the Prem...

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11 hours ago, MackworthRamIsGod said:

Our recruitment has been abysmal for years, it genuinely sickens me to think of all the millions that have been chucked away by the club, a lot of that was during the Sam Rush days, but it really is a ridiculous amount.

The whole recruitment set up is a joke (from my limited knowledge), first we hired Chris Evans, then we let him go, then we recruited him again and I assume he has gone again? 

We clearly dont scout abroad, we continuously find ourselves linked with overpriced championship players that we have no chance of signing and were constantly pipped to by the likes of Aston Villa.

Antonio, Kodija, Da Laet, Lansbury, Assombolonga, James Chester, Tyrone Mings, Connor Hourihane, Glenn Whelan, Adomah, jota, John McGinn etc etc etc

Meanwhile, Brentford and even Peterborough continue to find player after player that they bring in, nurture and sell for millions...I'd rather be doing that than trying to get promotion, at least we would be seeing the likes of Marriott scoring 30 goals, Watkins bagging 20 goals or Ivan Tony this season banging them in.

Our recruitment needs a shake up from the ground up and Mr Cocu should be the man to sort it!

Our recruitment has been that abysmal that we have been in the play offs in 4 out of the last 5 seasons, despite being against teams with parachute payments.

Were we pipped to these signings by Villa (that would be the Villa that are now in the Premier League after signing these over priced Championship players) or do we actually have no idea whether we were interested in them or not?

If you think recruitment should be done at younger levels then surely our current recruitment team needs a few more years to see if they have been successful or not?

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21 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Our recruitment has been that abysmal that we have been in the play offs in 4 out of the last 5 seasons, despite being against teams with parachute payments.

Were we pipped to these signings by Villa (that would be the Villa that are now in the Premier League after signing these over priced Championship players) or do we actually have no idea whether we were interested in them or not?

If you think recruitment should be done at younger levels then surely our current recruitment team needs a few more years to see if they have been successful or not?

Very very good point.

Yes we have been competitive so the recruitment team must be doing something right.

In fact you may be onto something here, because I was going to follow this up by saying, how many players do we buy who then go onto being sold for more than we paid? I can think Ince and Vydra, maybe Albentosa? Not many from memory. A lot of signings tend to lose value and it isn't because they play for years and naturally age.

Perhaps the issue lies with whoever negotiates the deals and then the coaching staff who turn supposedly good players (Jozefzoon) into absolute spanners (Jozefzoon).

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41 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

Our recruitment has been that abysmal that we have been in the play offs in 4 out of the last 5 seasons, despite being against teams with parachute payments.

Obviously (in a slightly sick sense) the past few seasons have been reasonably successful although one can attribute last season to messers Wilson, Mount and Tomori. The problem is that if one looks at our balance sheet of transfers and the squad we have today, it's leaves one scratching their heads a little if we're saying the recruitment has been 'good'.

For me, the problem is obviously with continuity - Different managers have different philosophies which require different personnel, that's why we've ended up with a disjointed, unbalanced and expensive squad. By that, I certainly don't mean a 4-2-3-1, 4-3-3, 3-1-6 or whatever - As soon as people bang on about the importance of these, I assume they don't actually watch football.

Recruitment will start to look more impressive if we actually keep a manager for more than 12 months, if that means we have to go backwards to go forwards, so be it. That's life.

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31 minutes ago, MackworthRamIsGod said:

Very very good point.

Yes we have been competitive so the recruitment team must be doing something right.

In fact you may be onto something here, because I was going to follow this up by saying, how many players do we buy who then go onto being sold for more than we paid? I can think Ince and Vydra, maybe Albentosa? Not many from memory. A lot of signings tend to lose value and it isn't because they play for years and naturally age.

Perhaps the issue lies with whoever negotiates the deals and then the coaching staff who turn supposedly good players (Jozefzoon) into absolute spanners (Jozefzoon).

So which players that have lost money were identified by the recruitment team and which ones by the managers?

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