The Recruitment Team

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I am going to play Devils Advocate a bit.

Just had a discussion with Google Gemini about comparing our set up to Brentford, Sunderland and Coventry (based on my criteria that they are mid to low PL sides we are similar to (Coventry) or aspire to be like.

The big difference is they have Sporting Directors, who oversee all of other staff and provide the strategy. We don't have this and Wilder clearly wouldn't operate in this way and would cost us a lot to implement this structure (at a time when we know we are trying to control costs).

What it means is that all of these staff report into Wilder (either officially or unofficially) and their role is to provide him with what he wants/needs and what he can do the best with. Rightly or wrongly, it would be like having a master stone mason and buying high quality kitchen knives as tools. Whilst Wilder talks about "we" need culture carriers, what I think he means is "he" needs culture carriers as that is who he feels he can get the most out of.

Having the manager being the focus of all these roles is similar at other Championship sides where change of manager means a change in backroom staff too.

I think its a bit unfair to be calling out some of these staff members based on their CVs. Its the equivalent of only recruiting people from Cambridge or Oxford even if they are crap at a job. If due process was done, these were the best candidates we could hire based on our criteria.

Lee Dykes, Technical Director at Brentford has those lofty clubs of Bury FC and Carlisle on his CV. He was recently interviewed by Liverpool for a role so clearly heading in the right direction.

I am not waving the Wilder is king flag, the club is clearly going through a stage where we need change at some point in the near future, I just don't think that calling out our First Team Training and Individuals Analyst is really what's holding the club back.
 
I am going to play Devils Advocate a bit.

Just had a discussion with Google Gemini about comparing our set up to Brentford, Sunderland and Coventry (based on my criteria that they are mid to low PL sides we are similar to (Coventry) or aspire to be like.

The big difference is they have Sporting Directors, who oversee all of other staff and provide the strategy. We don't have this and Wilder clearly wouldn't operate in this way and would cost us a lot to implement this structure (at a time when we know we are trying to control costs).

What it means is that all of these staff report into Wilder (either officially or unofficially) and their role is to provide him with what he wants/needs and what he can do the best with. Rightly or wrongly, it would be like having a master stone mason and buying high quality kitchen knives as tools. Whilst Wilder talks about "we" need culture carriers, what I think he means is "he" needs culture carriers as that is who he feels he can get the most out of.

Having the manager being the focus of all these roles is similar at other Championship sides where change of manager means a change in backroom staff too.

I think its a bit unfair to be calling out some of these staff members based on their CVs. Its the equivalent of only recruiting people from Cambridge or Oxford even if they are crap at a job. If due process was done, these were the best candidates we could hire based on our criteria.

Lee Dykes, Technical Director at Brentford has those lofty clubs of Bury FC and Carlisle on his CV. He was recently interviewed by Liverpool for a role so clearly heading in the right direction.

I am not waving the Wilder is king flag, the club is clearly going through a stage where we need change at some point in the near future, I just don't think that calling out our First Team Training and Individuals Analyst is really what's holding the club back.
Appreciate the point, but I think he’s calling out the recruitment team and making the point that at the head is an ex analyst who doesn’t seem to have had much previous in the recruitment department. It’s like he followed Wilder around as an analyst until we apparently needed a head of recruitment. Straight back into a job.

I do think we seem to have quite a lot of staff analysing. What the fuck are they actually analysing? With what tools? If the sum total of all that analysis is to be BBD Chong Choudhury and Ayew then someone needs to get them a group policy at SpecSavers.

Maybe less analysis and more coaching?
 
I’m on a six hour trip via KL to Manila so I thought I’d continue the illustration above and make our recruitment guys redundant or make their work half done.

Original criteria is out of contract in 12 months, 23-32, rated at €1.5-€6m, playing for English, Scottish or Welsh clubs, or playing anywhere but being a citizen or having secondary citizenship from one of the home Nations and Republic of Ireland.

Then I’ve looked at out of contract in 12 months overall and seen if any fall outside this group but may sneak in i.e. age or value falls outside but a candidate under the other criteria (marked with a *). Also removed any Wednesday players (Valery, Lowe) or daft wages (Mings, Lindelof, Dunk, Burn):

Goalkeepers (2)
Zetterstrom (Derby), Stolarczyk (Leicester)

Right Backs (8)
Walker* (Burnley), Sterling (Rangers), Ralston (Celtic), Lotomba (Celtic), Ngakia (Watford), Stacey (Norwich), Roberts (Burnley), Lennon (Colombus)

Left Backs (7)
Mandana (Sunderland), Konan (Wolves), Manning (Saints), Borges (Boro), Pickering (Blackburn), Ferry (Dundee United), Longalo (Motherwell)

Centre backs (15)
Ekdal (Burnley), Latibeaudiere (Coventry), Carter (Blackburn), Cooper (Millwall), Brown (Oxford), Bayer (Burnley), McNair, Ajayi* (Hull City), O’Nien* (Sunderland), Souttar (Rangers), Hyam (Wrexham), Sykes (USG), Panzo (Levadiakos), Tuanzebe (Auxerre), Holgate (Al Gharafa)

Central Midfield (9)
Reed (Fulham), Hughes (Palace), Browne* (Sunderland), Kayembe (Watford), Cullen (Burnley), Da Silva (Brentford), Laurent (Burnley), Cifuentes (Rangers), Turnbull (Cardiff)

Attacking Midfield (3)
Jun Ho Bae (Stoke), Cantwell (Blackburn), Gauld (Vancouver)

Left Winger (4)
Edozie (Saints), Fraser (McArthur), Saleh (Al-Wasl), Thomas* (Limassol)

Right Winger (10)
Diatta (Watford), Longman (Wrexham), Sakamoto (Coventry), Traore (Wolves), Goodrham (Oxford), Ba (Sunderland), Omur (Hull City), Said (Motherwell), Ronald (Swansea), Diangana (Elche)

Striker (6)
Brewster (Derby), Connolly (Orient), Ohashi (Blackburn), Maswanhise (Motherwell), Adams (Torino), Maja (Le Havre)

Unless finances change then based on what we know about the management, I’d imagine the above gives an idea what ‘the pool’, 64 players in total, looks like, with a few randoms thrown in i.e. Lennon from Columbus with the second Nationality as Irish and a UAE player with Scottish as his.

UTB
 

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