A lot of scouts use scouting applications to identify players, then send a freelance scout to watch them. Once they've made a recommendation the club will send out one of their own scouts. As even MLS has a global scouting network I assume all the big European clubs have them too.
Do MLS clubs have global scouting networks? Do you have any articles that talk about MLS clubs scouting outside the US and Canada. I would love more information on that aspect of scouting.
Philadelphia has been scouting Cameron and other countries in Africa the last couple of years. http://www.phillysoccerpage.net/2018/07/16/bethlehem-steel-fc-sign-a-striker/ NY Red Bulls and NYCFC obviously have global scouting networks considering their ownership groups own teams in other countries. Montreal Impact likely have a global network as well, considering Saputo also owns Bologna in Italy.
I wanted to highlight a podcast for all of you guys who are interested in the future of scouting. On a recent episode of TheTopDrawerSoccer Show posted on July 6th, host Travis Clark sat down with Matt Martin, the CEO of a new company called The Soccer Syndicate (http://thesoccersyndicate.com/). The company is billed as "the first independent, professional soccer scouting company in North America." I wanted to post some thoughts here on what this might mean. * Martin came from the Air Force and served in a variety of roles as an analyst/IT manager/network manager, where he had some experience in coaching * He started sending scouting reports to MLS executives, including Jeff Agoos * At this point, he teaches a class in scouting * Has worked with several teams, including NYRB, SKC, and Portland * His new company's first contract was with RSL (@irondeepbicycle, have you seen anything about how the club is using this service?) to scout players to add to their residency program * I enjoyed Matt's response to a question from Travis; he was insistent that there is "not enough accurate documentation!" and that many scouts and coaches and pundits use too general descriptors of a player's performance * He and his scouts focus on the player's decision making & their technique, but they go one step further and examine how player's team is performing and how the player is adapting to the gameplan * He eventually wants to have clients all over the world, selling information on players to clubs in Europe as well as simply helping an MLS club prepare for the draft Give it a listen. It will be interesting to see what comes of the company and how it will interact with MLS teams.
@Paul Berry, thanks for sharing that article! It was interesting and I enjoy Matt Pentz's work. Happy to see him at The Athletic now.
Reviving this thread, with another article about the Sounders. If you guys see anything regarding scouting by other MLS teams, please share in this thread! This is a piece written by Joseph Mondello, who covers the Academy for SoundersFC.com. I'd like to highlight a couple of things I found interesting, but the full article is worth your time. You can find it here. Since 2015, the club has consolidated its scouting and talent identification programs and no longer relies on open tryouts to identify players. The first full-time Academy team starts at the U-15 level, but the Sounders Discovery Program (SDP) invites top players throughout the state in the U-12, U-13, and U-14 age groups to train twice a week in four-month cycles with Sounders coaches, using the club's curriculum and methodology. This allows the team's coaches to evaluate how they respond to the training and monitor their progress over 2-3 years. The Academy staff also includes a full-time scout and an expansive network of coaches covering all of Washington. I really like the distinction that Henry Brauner, at the time the Head of Recruitment for the Academy, made between talent identification and scouting and hopefully all MLS clubs are trending toward scouting and away from simply identifying talent. Scouting is a much more holistic, in-depth process, getting a full picture of a player, both in the game and off the field. Another great thing Seattle is doing is locating and establishing partnerships and affiliates. They currently have 8, several of which are in underserved areas like Yakima, Spokane, North Carolina, and central California. Final thing I want to point out is the extensiveness of Seattle's national scouting network. It consists of roughly 20 coaches, spanning every level of youth soccer, and at any given point the club is tracking the progress of around 90 national players. Note: The article on scouting and talent ID is only part 1 in a 4-part series written by Mondello. You can find links to all 4 parts on this page.
Revs to double scouting staff: https://www.nesoccerjournal.com/new-england-revolution-to-double-scouting-staff-team-source/
Interesting. Just found this thread. You will find little to no articles on scouting for the SJ Earthquakes. Until the past year or so, we figured that they scouting was primarily the GM watching tape and then making a decision on a player. There appeared to be no scouting network or even a staff. As far as the USSF, it came down to who you knew among your network of coaches. Outside of the network, good luck. Go attend a few tournaments and watch tape, talk to the head coach. Just guessing here, but I'm probably not far off. With the league maturing, I suspect that it will change, but we (MLS and USSF) has away's to go.
From a presentation yesterday by Tony Lepore: Six 🔑 Qualities of a YNT Player pic.twitter.com/151vJwVcRW— Joe Gould (@twelfthyank) January 10, 2019
The USSF wasn't very good. At least compared to Vermes. It's nominally a 1v1 Q&A with @AlexiLalas but Peter Vermes is not your average interview subject - he's starting with a meaty presentation on how they do things at SKC. It's pretty impressive... #CHI19 pic.twitter.com/orzL5itcDo— Charles Boehm (@cboehm) January 10, 2019 Vermes views every coach at the club, at all levels, as part of the same (his) staff. Intensive and formalized communication and coordination between all levels. pic.twitter.com/QCpG4ipeSu— Charles Boehm (@cboehm) January 10, 2019 Vermes pointed to the "culture" slide to note the photo of the SKC U-14s celebrating a PK shootout championship win - with HGP Gianluca Busio celebrating front and center with his younger clubmates. pic.twitter.com/xMLE3gpXzx— Charles Boehm (@cboehm) January 10, 2019 SKC now have a director of player care, who assists players and their families with various aspects of life off the pitch. pic.twitter.com/F0v2SQpvvK— Charles Boehm (@cboehm) January 10, 2019 Asked to comment on the state of the USMNT program, Vermes says "we've done ourselves a disservice" by failing to vertically integrate across age groups to inculcate a style of play and way of working so that players can rise through the system and grow/evolve efficiently— Charles Boehm (@cboehm) January 10, 2019
Ran across this article on Twitter a couple days ago. It's a short interview piece, kinda clickbait-ey, and it's geared more towards giving young players advice on how to get noticed by YNT scouts. What's nice about the article is that we get to meet one of the Federation's scouts, Shawn Beyer. He's on Twitter if you want to follow him (@CoachShawnB74). I'll highlight some of his responses to the author's questions below: SN: When you show up to a scouting assignment, what happens before the game starts? SB: Each coach gives me a schematic. That schematic has the roster, date of birth, and the formation of the starting 11. Coaches can offer us recommendations before a game, like “keep an eye on this player.” They’ll write it on the schematic, or they’ll just tell us. I also do research before the game to see which players have been performing well, have already been part of YNT camp, or Talent ID Centers. ----------------------------- SN: What’s the difference between a Youth National Team and a Talent ID Center? SB: Younger players can be identified by us and get invited to a “Talent ID Center.” It’s a one-day or a half-day event with lots of players where we take them through high-level training and scrimmages. It’s regional, and we make sure it’s at a location where everyone can drive there. The YNT camps are a smaller group of players from across the nation. These players have excelled at the ID Centers. It could be a week long training camp or an international tournament. These are all expenses paid. ---------------------------- SN: You mentioned that at your games, there will be kids who were already invited to camps and Talent ID centers. How did that happen for them? SB: Most of these players have been scouted for years, have been through the YNT ID Centers, and they built up a long history. This is important to know: You don’t get invited to a camp or an ID Center because of one great performance at one game. You have to build up multiple reports and be scouted many times. ----------------------------- SN: What happens with those reports? SB: Each region has a Talent ID Manager. Those managers see all of the reports the scouts submit. We have an online system where we submit our reports. From these reports, our managers establish a depth chart for each age group. The top tier of the national depth chart would be the starting lineup for that year’s YNT, of course, then it goes down from there. The players at the top would have tons of reports. The more reports a player gets, the more consideration that player would get. [Oooo, to be able to access that database!!] ----------------------------- SN: When you’re watching a game, what stands out most to you? What would a player do that merrits a “report?” SB: The main thing we look at is game awareness and decision making. Are their eyes up when they receive the ball? Do they analyze the field for positions of players and spaces to exploit? Are they looking around before they get the ball? If they trap the ball and then they’re looking around, it’s too late. I pay attention to players that draw my attention in a good way. I’ll start looking at them when they have the ball and when they don’t have the ball. What they do during transition moments is also very important. The game is so fast at the international level. You have to be able to transition from defending to attacking in a split second, or the game has passed you. ------------------------------ SN: It sounds like if a player wants to be considered for the US National Team, that player needs to be on a DA team to get scouted and compile these reports. Is there any way for a player who’s not on a DA team to make it to a Youth National Team? SB: Ninety-five percent of my assignments are DA. That’s where we look. A kid who wants to be on the national team could benefit from the environment the DA provides. Because you have to remember: in a YNT Camp, you’re also going to be competing against those international kids who come from European and Mexican or South American professional academies into the national camps. So it can help prepare the player to have experience in the DA or international — training in Mexico, Europe, South America— if you have the goal of being on a US National Team.
Wanted to post this excerpt from an interview with FC Dallas youth soccer VP Chris Hayden, published on April 9th: AM: How does your scouting outside Dallas function ? CH: We have some very important affiliate relationships that we look to outside of DFW. We also have scouts looking at markets that do not fall into other MLS Home Territory restrictions. When we locate and identify a top talent, we invite the player in to trial with us for a week. During that training opportunity, we will see how the player adapts within our environment. Many of our top talents were local players that we have at the age of 10 (or younger). We have another group of players that we have brought in at around 13-14. Our scouting is designed to find young local players and talented 13-14 year old players from out of the area. Link: http://breakingthelines.com/interview/interview-with-fc-dallas-youth-soccer-vp-chris-hayden/
Interesting article from Bobby Warshaw about attending “scout school” at 2018’s GenAd Cup: https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2018...soccer-scout-school-generation-adidas-cup?amp
Whoops. Yeah, try this one: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.ml...soccer-scout-school-generation-adidas-cup?amp
He's right, but in fairness, clubs can do this better and more easily than the USSF can. And their survival depends on it, so they have the incentive.
"Ninety-five percent of my assignments are DA. That’s where we look. A kid who wants to be on the national team could benefit from the environment the DA provides. Because you have to remember: in a YNT Camp, you’re also going to be competing against those international kids who come from European and Mexican or South American professional academies into the national camps. So it can help prepare the player to have experience in the DA or international — training in Mexico, Europe, South America— if you have the goal of being on a US National Team." That is a very troubling quote. Not every player will want to be on a DA team, or have nearby access to one. I understand with the sheer size of the country some players will slip. But to have 95% as just DA games, its absurd. Its not that hard in this day and time to just build a network of coaches who upload information onto a database for a couple of full time scouts to go through. Break it down by state, or by region or whatever. Then send the actual travelling scouts out to watch them in person a few times. But I think this does also highlight why the college game thrives, so many players dont even get recognized by our NT until theyre 20+.
https://www.espn.com/soccer/united-...ion-player-development-and-tactical-evolution Ignore the weird FIFA video game rankings at the top, scroll down to talent identification. Ill post the interesting bits here for those who dont want to read the whole thing: "...were nine technical advisers spread out across the country covering club development, youth national team responsibilities and scouting. The scouting piece has now been broken off so that, under Tony Lepore, the USSF's director of boys talent ID, there are three full-time talent ID managers, one each in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York. There are plans to add a fourth." We have 3 people scouting the entire country full time, which is crazy for the sheer size. 9 is not enough but you can at least quadrant 9, now you split the country into thirds, no way they see every player they should. "Underneath the talent ID advisers are around 90 "per diem" scouts who are given individual assignments that include watching a specific player or players or attending showcases and scouting events. Then there are the informal networks that include coaches and staff from MLS and amateur academies, as well as coaches in the Olympic Development Program and id2, the talent identification program used by US Club Soccer. There are comparable numbers on the girls' side. Lepore estimates that the per diem scouts receive a total of about 3,000 assignments per year." 90 x 3000= 270,000 trips a year for per diem scouts to hit games or showcases where multiple prospects would be. Currently there are about 70 million kids in the us(under 18) which means less than 1 percent of current children (some who dont play soccer but on weekends because of responsibilities, etc) those who do play soccer about 4 million or so (for known school, clubs, rec leagues, etc not counting areas that may only play regionally) about 9 percent of playing children are seen (if every trip is unique and not seeing the same player. Now more troubling, 2 or 3 of the talent ID (not sure how they dont know) speak spanish but only 20 or so are Latin, but they dont know if they speak spanish and they dont know how many are African American. And finally the DA quotes "The DA itself sparks plenty of debate. Stewart has said he wants "the best playing with the best against the best" and it's taken the form of a national league split up into regions. At the U18 and U19 level, the USSF DA has taken to seeding teams in separate divisions, which conspicuously looks set up to accommodate MLS academies -- which sources said had threatened to leave the DA due to substandard competition -- at the expense of their non-MLS brethren. There is near universal agreement among coaches that a season of 25-30 games isn't enough.... cost of travel for 2 teams about 900,000 and nearest game 800 miles away" Travelling that far for one game, and then basically a high school schedule is not enough and its not like MLS is the best at being partial. Anyway, interesting read up and I hope it sparks some discussion and some change within how the US scouts and sets up players. I think the whole department needs overworked, but the funding needs to be there. It should be there, since it is the future of the sport but its not yet.
Also should add this is estimates only, and some of the numbers were taken from US Youth Soccer while others come directly from the article.
The following paragraph you posted suggests there are hundreds of scouts and coaches across the country. But the article doesn't explain whether these are formally matricized (good) or whether it's all ad hoc (bad). Most countries now rely almost entirely on their professional clubs to develop players. The US seems to be doing more than that. It just needs to be consistent with some sort of metric to prove whether or not it's effective.
Thats where my assumption lies, is that they have 3 talent ID people, 90 men and women who travel on a per diem basis, who may or may not be trained adequately. Thats the scouting mechanism under the USSF, whether they rely solely on that or embrace MLS is something more than what I know. My complain is we at least need 10 ID personnel and a team like Arsenal has 12 scouts just in the UK. Relying on pro clubs is only as good as the Academies themselves, or pro teams, and like the article also mentions there are several problems currently with those. Which again how good do the pro teams scout areas outside of their footprint? I suppose my number 1 complaint is the lack of an actual scouting network, something more intricate than Jim hopping on a plane and watching Joe play a u14 park game. Maybe there is not enough money there, but they need to find a better system than scouting say 10 percent of the entire playing populice outside of the guys who were identified early on. Something similair to the PFSA would be adequate, I mean there were rumors Gwyn Williams had some 77000 profiles.
Surely you need to compare Arsenal to a club not a Federation. Beyond Washington, Seattle Sounders has a national scouting network of 20 coaches and several more internationally. “We’ve done a great job of identifying targets from out of state,” said S2 assistant coach Wade Webber, who spent two years as an Academy coach. “You’re not coming into the Sounders unless you are national team level as an outside player. We’re starting to identify our Homegrown targets younger. They’re bringing in 15-year-olds and teaching them the Sounders culture. Then when they get to be 17 and 18, they really feel like they’re from Seattle, and they’ve been developed in the Sounders’ brand of soccer.” "In 2015, the club also launched the Homestay Program, which links out-of-territory Sounders Academy players with local families, providing these young prospects with their own support network while exponentially expanding the pool of potential players for the club. The first Homestay player in club history was U.S. youth national team left back Nick Hinds, who currently plays for S2."