WW Scouting
World Wide Scouting (sometimes called Global Scouting) Neither the training ground nor the new stadium would be any good at all without the team to go with it. But Arsenal at the time of Mr Wenger’s arrival, was not a rich club – certainly not able to compete with Manchester Utd. Later other teams came along spending far more money than Arsenal had – Chelsea, Liverpool, Tottenham and even Portsmouth came with their millions from a variety of sources. Yet throughout Arsenal managed on an average of £6 million a year. Partly this was achieved through having a huge profit from players sold on (Anelka was the perfect example, with a profit of some £20 million). But mostly it was achieved through Global Scouting – we got gifts from Vieira to Cesc, and no one could stop us. Global Scouting is unique to Arsenal – and having got in there first it is hard, if not impossible, for other clubs to follow. Indeed it is not uncommon to hear other managers complain that there are no talented youngsters available, “Arsenal get them all.” Put another way, the reason that young English players are so expensive is that the standards in the Premiership have gone up from being best in the country to best in the world – even at the age of 16. And the reason that we have this situation is Mr Wenger’s Global Scouting. It would be unfair to suggest that Mr Wenger invented the idea – Ajax have had endless teams of youngsters drawn from across Holland, feeding their first team squad. What Mr Wenger did was to expand it initially to a Europe wide model, and then eventually a global model. When the fans say “Arsene knows” what they really mean is that the manager knows everything there is to know about young players across the world. This knowledge is fed by the greatest network of scouts that the world of football has ever seen – from Garde and Grimandi onwards ex-players have been recruited to supplement the standard basic scouting team the club already had. Of course it took a few years to get the stream of talent up and running – at first there were just a few players coming through, but gradually the numbers built up it became clear that a growing proportion of the Arsenal team could be built up from players that cost far less than their later value. Even when Arsenal bought established internationals such as Ljunberg it quickly became clear that Arsenal had got a bargain, and that within a year or two the value of the player had escalated. And what bargains we have seen. Henry and Vieira were two early examples. Within a couple of years each player was beyond Arsenal’s ability to buy, but they were with us, playing for us, and with teams all over Europe pitching for them. And it continued – all the way through to our beloved Cesc who cost £250,000 and within two years was seemingly worth an incredible 100 times that amount. Of course Global Scouting is no good without that final piece of ability – the ability to see what each player could do. It doesn’t work every time – we know that – but it works so often, and the number of players coming through is escalating so fast – that the failures hardly matter. Longer term implications of Global Scouting Global Scouting for young players over a period of time results in the age of the players being recruited getting younger and younger, and this in turn leads to the need for up and coming players to be placed with other clubs on loan. By 2006/7 this had become a well-organised programme with four players going out on loan at once before the season started. Such a process can result in disappointment – it can look as if loan players never make it, and never come back to play for Arsenal. But what we have to see is that a few do go on loan to help them develop their game or recover from injury and then can return to the first team squad. A few don’t need loan periods at all, jumping into the first time even at the age of 16. For the rest, the loan is a final chance to show that they can move from being wonderkids into the sort of players who can make a serious contribution to the first team squad over a period of time. One other result that has annoyed rival teams beyond measure is the desire by young players to be coached by Mr Wenger. Seeing what has happened to Vieira, Henry, Berkgamp, Cesc and a dozen other players under Mr Wenger’s tutelage makes them desperate to come to Arsenal. They might get higher salaries at Manchester Utd,, Liverpool, and Chelsea, but they would sooner earn less to have the chance of studying the art of football under the man who invented a completely new system of coaching young players. If Henry can be turned from a fading star into a £50m superman, if Vieira can be turned from a player who can’t even make the first team into Europe’s premier defensive midfielder – what else can be achieved? We now see the results, and the players around the world take notice. Go to Chelsea and there is every chance you will do another “Wright Phillips” sitting in the stand, losing your place in the national squad, and getting a fat salary. Go to Manchester Utd and possibly be overtaken by another very expensive signing, and face a manager whose method of communication is reputed to be screaming in your face from a distance of two inches. No – better to go to Arsenal and be trained under the greatest trainer of young footballers the world has ever seen. The money can come later – first become a better player. The media reaction to Global Scouting Global Scouting is rarely if ever mentioned on the media. In fact it is ignored in such a way that reporters look at Arsenal and say things such as “seven players out, one in – they won’t do anything this year”. What they forget is that the players now forcing their way into the first team are players who were brought to Arsenal in the past few years who are now fighting their way through. Of course I don’t know which ones are really going to make it. Writing this in August 2006 I am hardly alone in picking out Armand Traore as someone about to make it big time. I also like the way Song has developed from his first faltering steps in the pre-season games of 2005. But then I also expected Lupoli to be making a bigger splash by now, and blow me down but Jeremie Aliadiere has returned from the dead to jump back ahead of him. I also expected Ryan Smith to be in the first team squad now, and instead he goes to Derby. Which shows why I am sitting here writing this and now part of the scouting system. But at least I can be compensated by the knowledge that the media do no better – unable to look beyond the big names, so out of touch (as comically shown by Five’s TV coverage of the opening match at the Emirates) that they don’t even know the names of most of the first team squad. The lovely thing is that neither do most rival supporters, and when they see these unknown youngsters come on as subs when yet another injury crisis hits us, they expect raw and rough talent. How little do they know. Mr Wenger, thank you for everything – but especially thank you for Global Scouting.
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