Squad Review/Planning:

My first job was to assess the squad overall to make sure there was enough depth per position. Once I had understood the squad depth, I needed to make sure that I was planning ahead as I mentioned in my intro, so if one player left, I already had someone in line to replace rather than scramble in the transfer window. 

The below is how I did my assessment and marked each player in a status to give me an idea on where I need to focus my recruitment. 

So, I would first look at my youth set up to see if there is anyone that can make the step up. If not, this is where I would set my recruitment focus in that position and start to shortlist players and scout before looking to bring them onboard. I will discuss recruitment in more detail further down, but the above was basically one of the first things I did when taking charge in the summer. 

Tactical approach:

I couldn’t just plug in any random tactic here, I wanted to review the side and see which players I needed to build around. I noticed I had a lot of attacking full backs and wingers who like to cut inside and act as more inside forwards rather than a traditional winger. Therefore, it made sense to go with the above system which is a Marcelo Bielsa inspired system in terms of the attacking with no fear, pressing high and with intent as well as overlapping full backs. 

When it comes to recruitment, each player needs to fit into this system and essentially slot into position. For example, if I am looking for a winger, I will want to look for one that likes to cut inside, take plenty of shots and have a high number of goal contributions. It wouldn’t make sense for me to look for a winger that crosses well as that is not what i’m really looking for in a winger. 

Staff Upgrade:

One of my other first jobs was to upgrade the backroom staff team. In order to get the maximum out of our facilities and set up, we need good quality coaches who can develop the players. This is very much a work in progress as I cannot have all the best coaches in the league instantly, this will take time to build as we are competing with some of the giants such as Ajax. 

Before:

Current:

I also had to adjust the scouting team as we are looking at specific markets/countries so need the staff from the relevant countries to be with us to help with our recruitment. So this is where in the short term, the scouting department won’t be the best however, I have had scouts with a good level of knowledge per country. 

Identifying targets:

As mentioned in the intro, once we get into December, there is enough time for data to be built up for most of the countries we are tapping into. I made a shortlist per position, so in the worst case if I had any departures in January, I already would have scouted and tracked players. 

Here is the steps I took to shortlist a player:

So in player search, for this example I am looking for a striker. Based on my top striker, I wanted to pick out the top metrics to compare my potential finds with such as shots per 90, XG. Below, I will show there is more to it than just these 2 metrics but this is a soft search to begin with as we cannot expect every player to match up to my top striker, especially when we are searching untapped markets who are in lower tiers. 

I would make a list of the strikers and any that fit the general bill, I would initially scout to see if they check out in terms of their personality and if our scouts think they have potential to fit in at the Club. For example, if a player does not like big matches, is injury prone etc, they are not really a player we want here. Whereas if they are a professional, consistent performer etc, they are more likely to develop.

Below is an example of a striker that i tracked and scouted which then i added to the shortlist as he passed the initial phase:

Once I have done this per position, I could have a list of either a few or over 5 players on the shortlist. My job then is to compare these players against each other and then pick out a top 3 which I could compare them with our current player in that position.

Example below is a snip from our wingers shortlist and as we can see, i have certain metrics in measuring them on which i change per position before putting them into the main list. 

I would then use the skin that fm mustermann has created to get me the metrics i need for each key player per position. 

As per below, I picked out 3 top metrics and then build a database to then add my other shortlist targets in and then see how they compare. 

In the above example for the goalkeeper, I needed a long term replacement to step up but for the short term i do not need to bring in anyone in this position. So I tracked P. Andreev as he stood out from the crowd in terms of his results. The pass competition metric is really subject to how the teams system is. He may play for a club where they do not focus on building out from the back, but you can develop a young player into doing this in the future, so that isn’t really a concern. However, having a high percentage in save ratio and a good expected goals prevented is someone that is good to have regardless of system and as long as the scout report checks out, then this is a player we would look to bring in. 

Below is some more examples of how i tracked players per position:

January Purchases:

So far, we brought in 19 year old Andreev the keeper who is a long term replacement for Ryan. Our 2nd choice keeper left the club and Ryan has 2 years left on his current deal, so Andreev will go out on loan and get experience and then slot in perfectly once Ryan is phased out. 

We needed a 2nd choice striker which we lacked quality in and had to utilise wingers as a short term measure. As per above tracking, D. Birligea a 23 year old from Romania stood out and brought him in to be a 2nd choice with the view of potentially stepping up into first choice if all goes well and our first choice is sold.

January Departures:

We did have some departures so far in January including prospect Schouten who was a cover at centre back. We have cover in that position for now but now do need to shortlist more players who can slot in as Schouten was a future first team star player once Martins Indi phased out so we need cover there. Also, we cashed in on De Wit the cover left back and promoted a youth player to take that slot for now but again, could do with tracking a long term left back. 

There could be more outgoings as this is as of mid january however, in terms of incomings I may look to wait until the summer depending on what happens. However, the earlier I let some of the future players settle in, the better it will be and not as much of a rush to plug in replacements. Our B team players in the 2nd tier of Dutch football, so there is already a good platform for players to develop in. 

Season Progress Update:

We are just under mid way in the season and currently sit 3rd. We are a high scoring team and create plenty of chances however, can leave ourselves exposed at the back at times, especially when playing teams like Ajax who are dangerous on the attack. In the Europa Conference, we have topped the group and now in the knockout phases. 

The next update will be more in depth on recruitment as we will be at the end of season by then and planning for the season ahead as well as showing the progress of new recruits and how it paid off. So far, we are on track as we have sold higher vs what we have spent which will be the consistent theme.

I suspect our star players will be tracked if not already by the bigger clubs, so the focus on shortlisting is high to avoid any surprise departures, so the work really needs to start asap.