Whitwell: How Manchester United recruit

[cathari]

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Excellent (and quite depressing) long-read from Laurie Whitwell. The piece details how United go about with recruitment, and features the post-saf-era, but also gives some insight into Sir Alex' recruitment strategy. The article contains so many details you'd think he's sat down with John Murtough for this one.

 

[horsechoker]

1) prepare a bid
2) monitor the situation
3) pay triple the cost at 11:59 on deadline day

 

[devil99]

Corrected it for you

SAF last few years
1) prepare a bid
2) monitor the situation
3) claim no value in the market or agent asking for more money and drop the deal

Post SAF era
1) prepare a bid
2) monitor the situation
2.1) lose couple of matches
3) panic and pay triple the cost at 11:59 on deadline day

 

[Galactic]

Copy paste here please

 

[Bert_]

Don't have an Athletic subscription but who is TrackerMan? Sounds like an OG youtube cnut.

 

[Counterfactual]

"The piece details how United go about with recruitment "

I'm guessing lots of alcohol, chants of "Dis-ney-land!", a dartboard with photos on it and a blindfold.

 

[Sparky Rhiwabon]

Don’t they currently just ask Ten Hag if he know anyone decent?

 

[sullydnl]

Don't have an Athletic subscription but who is TrackerMan? Sounds like an OG youtube cnut.

Behind Ten Hag is a recruitment team that has seen significant change itself in the last year while at the same time using a system that has been in place for several seasons. It was built by football director John Murtough, who joined the club in 2013, and head of recruitment Steve Brown, who arrived three years later.

Dubbed TrackerMan, it is a centralised database of hundreds of players that collates information and opinion from a global army of 140 scouts — 50 who work full-time and 90 casual staff who typically only work at weekends. From that pool, recommendations are made in committee meetings, with either Ten Hag or the recruitment team able to veto potential signings.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Yikes. A lot of sources within the system who think we’re doing a bad job at recruitment. Which is completely plausible when you can see we’re doing a bad job at recruitment.

 

[astracrazy]

He claims that Casemiro wasn't even considered until after the Brighton loss and that his name was only mentioned after a long recruitment meeting, yet Fred said he knew about it for months Casemiro was coming to us but couldn't say anything.

Comes across like he has written an article about our recruitment without actually knowing about our recruitment.

 

[KiD MoYeS]

Interesting read.

Some of the stand out points, for me:

• Glazer let United negotiate with Gakpo, knowing there was no money to move for him
• The chief negotiator, Keane, has not been made permanent because the club is for sale
• Another leading member of the scouting department, O'Boyle, was previously Klopp's fitness coach at Liverpool
• The data analyst has only started and has made hires to his team, the team members are yet to start though
• The data analyst has come from the fashion industry
• Ten Hag's signings can be considered successful and he only wants to target players of a certain character
• Some of our transfer dealings move slowly because Glazer sign off is always required and he is based in Florida
• The scouting department revamped and expanded under Mourinho, one of the reasons there was a list of ~800 right-back targets when Wan-Bissaka was signed is due to the bloated volume of scouted players nowadays which can also result in hidden gems being lost among the numbers

 

[Bert_]

Behind Ten Hag is a recruitment team that has seen significant change itself in the last year while at the same time using a system that has been in place for several seasons. It was built by football director John Murtough, who joined the club in 2013, and head of recruitment Steve Brown, who arrived three years later.

Dubbed TrackerMan, it is a centralised database of hundreds of players that collates information and opinion from a global army of 140 scouts — 50 who work full-time and 90 casual staff who typically only work at weekends. From that pool, recommendations are made in committee meetings, with either Ten Hag or the recruitment team able to veto potential signings.

Ah OK. Cheers. They just decided to name the database the morning after the Christmas party or something it seems

 

[Mockney]

Pretty sure there’s one of these for every era and they were all written to sound like we’re finally getting it right.

 

[cathari]

Don’t they currently just ask Ten Hag if he know anyone decent?

Seems so to me, but broadening on that I also think Ten Hag disregarded all the data in TrackerMan because he did not trust the players there to fit his philosophy and/or demands.

 

[cathari]

• The scouting department revamped and expanded under Mourinho, one of the reasons there was a list of ~800 right-back targets when Wan-Bissaka was signed is due to the bloated volume of scouted players nowadays which can also result in hidden gems being lost among the numbers

So, they built a scouting department fitting a multi-club structure, or a loan strategy like Chelsea’s, but never decided what to do with this huge setup. No wonder the club’s given to monitor almost every player out there, when in fact they are doing so.

One last thought though. With naming the system and all, are the Glazers can argue there’s some extra value in the club..?

 

[elmo]

Don't have an Athletic subscription but who is TrackerMan? Sounds like an OG youtube cnut.

The guy monitoring our transfer target flight routes.

 

[Neil_Buchanan]

Copy paste here please

https://archive.ph/

put the address of articles in here and they come up for free

 

[SAFMUTD]

Is that tracker man the same system that choose Wan Bissaka from among 1,000 right backs?

 

[cyberman]

He claims that Casemiro wasn't even considered until after the Brighton loss and that his name was only mentioned after a long recruitment meeting, yet Fred said he knew about it for months Casemiro was coming to us but couldn't say anything.

Comes across like he has written an article about our recruitment without actually knowing about our recruitment.

As per usual. I’m all for transfer muppets who have sources but this smells like a fluff piece