Manchester United's Chief Scout and Head of Global Scouting have left the club

VorZakone said:
Me too! Wasn't he really good for Sevilla?
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He was excellent for Reims and Sevilla but completely disappeared the moment he signed for PSG. I have never seen something like that.
 
Adnan said:
I was sacked and replaced by the more competent @mazhar13. My tweets were being sourced from all over the world, and I even brought Chilevision to the forum's attention..
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That summer you broke your foot or whatever was the best summer for transfer tweets for me.
 
dwd said:
I only remember as it was mainly you, someone else and myself posting them back in the day. Then @mazhar13 came along and blew us out the water so I couldn't be arsed anymore :lol:
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I think the other poster was called Red bistro.
 
I'm liking that there seems to be some movement behind the scenes in regards to club structure. I'd like to think this is Rangnick's doing but who knows?
 
Good. Now get rid of the person (s) who is (are) responsible for these 300k PW contracts.
 
Adnan said:
That's correct, you've got a good memory mate..
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Adnan summer 2015 keeping up with the Vidal news.
 
Clear that Ralf along with Ten Hag has pushed for them to leave the club which is a positive move
 
Really hard to gauge if this is a good thing or not. Currently it really could be viewed as pushing out poor scouts, or good scouts leaving because they haven't been listened to by the board. Hopefully the former and we see an improvement going forward.
 
Dargonk said:
Really hard to gauge if this is a good thing or not. Currently it really could be viewed as pushing out poor scouts, or good scouts leaving because they haven't been listened to by the board. Hopefully the former and we see an improvement going forward.
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This is it. Maybe one new person with more power can do both of their jobs. Hence the streamlining. We really needed a shakeup, let’s hope this isn’t just another false dawn.
 
macheda14 said:
He has the same experience Edwards had before he became Liverpool's DoF - and I could go into the archives of my posts on the matter, but he has far more experience than a lot of renowned DoF's when they took their jobs.

Who is reporting this 400k a week contract that is actually reputable, more the reports coming out are we aren't pursuing renegotiation but Ten Hag will be allowed a word on that.

Until Woodward left he was the ipso facto decision maker, it's only since Arnold has come in that Murtough in this structure has taken on more responsibilities.

Yes it was if the fact of the matter is that Rangnick is coming in as a consultant (the first step of which is understanding the specific failings of the club from squad level) and providing them with a brutal analysis. Also our main two choices for the job were Poch and ETH, both high pressing managers with other stylistic differences. These players needed to be prepared in kind for one of those two managers (we now know that a lot of them aren't suitable) - bringing in Garcia or Valverde who would have both been pragmatic may have got us top 4, but in reality we would have just continued playing low block counterattacking football and have another moment of reckoning when ETH found out that none of the players were suited to his style during pre-season. Now we know that our squad needs drasctic changes - if we had got top 4 relatively alright, the club wouldn't be pressured to make the wholesale they will now hopefully be pushed to do. You could now make the same yet bigger argument that we shouldnt bring in ETH because his system is poorly suited to our team, even Poch's system is poorly suited to our team. feck it, based on the work rate of our side, even Conte wouldn't have worked.

Again Michael Edwards was part of a backroom staff that was seen as a laughing stock before Klopp came in. Their recruitment was abysmal. You can hire from within and it can work. Have you ever worked at a company that is being mismanaged and sat there thinking how if you had the power to change things, everything would look better? Just because Murtough was employed by the club =/= bad at his job.

Cavani was a good signing for that one season, he did not need to be renewed. Heaton is a third keeper, weird stick to use to beat someone with. Varane has had injury problems, but that's as much on the medical staff and whoever wrote the risk assessment.

We have a new structure in place, in may easily be as bad as the last one, but equally it may turn out well.
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During Woodward's realm Jon was responsible to restructuring the youth academy, the scouting department, the recruitment department and to build the women's team. Woodward also placed him as a football director which basically made him the boss of most of the football side of Manchester United including Woodward's own mate Matt Judge and SAF's protegees Lawlor and Fletchery. So let's stop deluding ourselves on this. Murtough is indeed Woodward's main man and unless you believe that an accountant and the CEO of the biggest club in the world has the time to go into the nitty gritty of the football side of things (identifying talent etc) then in all possibility most of the job was being done by Murtough.

Regarding Edwards he had experience as head of performance analysis at Portsmouth (6 years) and Spurs (2 years) before moving to Liverpool. During that time he went up the ranks from head of performance and analysis (2 years), director of technical performance (2 years), technical director (1.5 years) and then sporting director. So he's hardly a Darren Fletcher. On top of that he added value into each role he had. Murtough on the other hand is said to have strengthen a youth academy whose still 4th place 10-14 points away from City at both U18 and U23. He has helped build a woman's team which saw the manager leaving because the organization at the club bordered to an insult and the least said about the recruitment and scouting departments the better. Not to forget that throughout the past year we've seen United sticking to Ole when he should be on the way out, placing a guy as technical director with barely zero experience in the role or a similar role, signing Varane and keeping Cavani despite being injury prone, spending 70m on a winger whose more comfortable on the left rather then on the right, offering a 400k a week contract to Pogba, refusing to sell Lingard whose now walking on a free, signing the likes of Mcshane and Heaton which weren't needed, giving contract extensions to the likes of Mata and of course bringing Rangnick as manager whose style is poorly suited to a team which is lazy and is built around counter attacking football.
 
Can anyone think of players (signed after 2013) who have actually gone on to be more successful after leaving United? The only one that comes to mind is Depay.

The list:
Fellaini, Falcao, Blind, Rojo, Herrera, Di Maria, Darmian, Schweinsteiger, Ibra, Darmian, Schniderlin, Mkhitariyan, Lukaku, Sanchez, James, Romero.

I don't know the latest on them. But it seems most of these players have been average after leaving United (except di maria and Ibra, but they were already well established when joining). Blind has been doing well for Ajax. Lukaku might still come good for Chelsea, but that's about it. The whole list is filled with one mistake after another. I'm not looking at the reason behind their failure.

The reason for bringing this up is to highlight how our scouting and player assessment has gone wrong over the years. We can say that our coaches have been bad, but if these players haven't really done anything after leaving United, we probably shouldn't have signed them in the first place. I could still say the same for a majority of the current lot. We cannot have so many failures after spending more than a billion.

This change is good and much needed.
 
Loon said:
Interesting thing is Neville responded on Twitter that Lawler had been marginalised for years. Why would they do that?
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Moyes seem to have had an aversion to anything linked with SAF. LVG had his own way, Mou is a difficult man and by the time the Portuguese left we were starting the recruitment restructuring led by Murtough.
 
Tom Van Persie said:
Jim Lawlor has been at the club since 2005.
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I'm pretty sure Fergie rated him highly, and signed players purely off his recommendation (Chicarito being one from memory).

Maybe times have moved on, but also I don't think it's a case of individuals of being at fault, it's been a systemic failure for a decade.
 
Given that Lawlor has had some success in the Fergie era, his sacking might seems strange to people like Gary Neville. But I think both of them might have had an old-fashioned approach to scouting, and were not able to deliver proper profiles, reports of players, etc. Not to mention a full list of failed transfers and overpaying for players.

Scouting and profiling has evolved rapidly over the past few years, and this is something Rangnick probably flagged. The club needs a modern approach in every department.
 
Watch now as Lawlor goes to a rival and they become the new Dortmund. Let’s just hope Murtough actually knows what he’s at. It wouldn’t be like us to get an appointment right let alone lots of appointments. I’ve also read on here from one of our members (and I’ve suspected it myself) that the day to day running of the club is clunky and everything is kicked up to america and the time difference can leave people waiting around an extra day before making even the most simple calls.
 
48 hours said:
Hopefully Matt Judge, the worst negotiator in the world, is out of the door next
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People are being strangely harsh with Judge. Negotiation is based on leverage, United has continuously created situations where whoever is negotiating has no leverage mainly because our recruitment has been driven by managers who were fixated on a single player. If you don't play the field, you are kind of screwed, you have no leverage because everyone knows that you have no alternatives.
 
atkar83 said:
So where did the scouts that found the likes of Nani, CR7, Chicharito, etc. etc. go? Did they all leave and were replaced by inferior scouts or did they just luck out back then?
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Was some of that perhaps just Carlos' influence and the Mendes connection?
 
devilish said:
During Woodward's realm Jon was responsible to restructuring the youth academy, the scouting department, the recruitment department and to build the women's team. Woodward also placed him as a football director which basically made him the boss of most of the football side of Manchester United including Woodward's own mate Matt Judge and SAF's protegees Lawlor and Fletchery. So let's stop deluding ourselves on this. Murtough is indeed Woodward's main man and unless you believe that an accountant and the CEO of the biggest club in the world has the time to go into the nitty gritty of the football side of things (identifying talent etc) then in all possibility most of the job was being done by Murtough.
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Looks like this to me, too. Murtough has been in the vicinity of plenty of disasters, though he seems to have improved the youth side of things (the players you produce are more important than trophies/league tables there). Just since becoming director he's been around rewarding OGS with an undeserved contract, re-signing Ronaldo, sticking with Ole for too long, letting Conte go to Spurs, the usual terrible injury record, hiring an interim manager, taking 6 months to hire Ten Hag, and plenty more. Maybe he needs time, but no-one can say it hasn't got worse since he's been in. That could just be a coincidence, but I'm sure there'd be plenty who could do a much better and faster job than what he's doing.

It reminds me of how United tried to "make it work with Ole". Are they trying to "make it work with John"? To me, there are a few too many parallels between Ole and Murtough.
 
devilish said:
During Woodward's realm Jon was responsible to restructuring the youth academy, the scouting department, the recruitment department and to build the women's team. Woodward also placed him as a football director which basically made him the boss of most of the football side of Manchester United including Woodward's own mate Matt Judge and SAF's protegees Lawlor and Fletchery. So let's stop deluding ourselves on this. Murtough is indeed Woodward's main man and unless you believe that an accountant and the CEO of the biggest club in the world has the time to go into the nitty gritty of the football side of things (identifying talent etc) then in all possibility most of the job was being done by Murtough.

Regarding Edwards he had experience as head of performance analysis at Portsmouth (6 years) and Spurs (2 years) before moving to Liverpool. During that time he went up the ranks from head of performance and analysis (2 years), director of technical performance (2 years), technical director (1.5 years) and then sporting director. So he's hardly a Darren Fletcher. On top of that he added value into each role he had. Murtough on the other hand is said to have strengthen a youth academy whose still 4th place 10-14 points away from City at both U18 and U23. He has helped build a woman's team which saw the manager leaving because the organization at the club bordered to an insult and the least said about the recruitment and scouting departments the better. Not to forget that throughout the past year we've seen United sticking to Ole when he should be on the way out, placing a guy as technical director with barely zero experience in the role or a similar role, signing Varane and keeping Cavani despite being injury prone, spending 70m on a winger whose more comfortable on the left rather then on the right, offering a 400k a week contract to Pogba, refusing to sell Lingard whose now walking on a free, signing the likes of Mcshane and Heaton which weren't needed, giving contract extensions to the likes of Mata and of course bringing Rangnick as manager whose style is poorly suited to a team which is lazy and is built around counter attacking football.
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The youth academy isn’t what it once was, and is in no way on par with City, but it has turned around in recent years.

Where are you getting that Murtough was in charge of scouting? However now it looks like restructuring is happening so there we go.

The women’s team are doing well - the lack of facilities is a lack of investment. Is that his fault? It also looks like its Being rectified.

Edward Woodward only left his post properly in February the responsibility of sacking Ole was still firmly on his shoulders.

Yes we had that new structure in place but again it was still hamstrung by Woodward being around.

Murtough also has a long career. Edwards, prior to being made director with Klopp around, was not viewed as having done a good job. Liverpool’s recruitment was poor. They had one very good season under Rodgers admittedly, but the football structure was seen as a joke. It’s crazy what a good manager can do to reshape that.

Regarding Fletcher being hired, it’s a really lazy point that people use to beat the club with. It’s pretty common place in football :

Cech is Chelsea's technical director just under a slightly different job title, with no prior experience.

Monchi became Sevilla’s Sporting Director immediately after he retired as their goalkeeper.

Tixiki Begiristain retired, became a commentator and then 3 years later became the DoF at Barcelona.

Michael Zorc became sporting director at Dortmund immediately after retiring in 1998.

Hasan Salihamidžić retired in 2012 knocked around as a pundit and then became sporting director at Bayern in 2017.

Before going into management Zidane was appointed as advisor to the president at Real Madrid in 2009 and was one of the key decision makers alongside along with general director Jorge Valdano and sporting director Miguel Pardeza.

It's really quite a common occurrence that former players take up key roles in important positions in top top clubs. And most of these have taken on bigger positions than Fletcher.

Resigning Cavani this season was as much on Ole as it was anyone and at the beginning of the season was it such a mistake? Greenwood was being developed to be our future CF and what would be the issue having Cavani around to fill the squad. Varane give it more than a season before you are so sure his a sick note. Rangnick has been pretty damning about our medical team, so you shouldn’t be surprised if they get some restructuring too. Heaton was bought in as a third keeper, I don’t know why that’s so weird to you. McShane is a coach at u23 level, why is that something you keep mentioning? I mean it’s weird that he plays, but it seems to be a new concept they are trying out. Who knows it it works.

Sancho again too early to say, but give it a season also with hindsight being how it is. At least we have a semi alright left winger now, Rashford is looking like shit.

Mata was given a contract with the view that we would then take him into the business side of the club. Also frankly when he’s come on recently he’s been our best player. But again was Mata’s contract Murtough’s choice.

Show me where Pogba’s 400k contract renewal is being reported by a reputable journo.

I mean I responded to Rangnick point. If we had limped to fourth with a counter attacking manager do you think we would be about to go through this massive wholesale change we are about to bring in. I mean just re read my initial response to you.

I don’t know why a good third of your post there is you just repeating points I responded to and not responding to my response.

The new structure with Murtough as football director has existed in reality since February. What’s the point of getting all twisted before we see if it works or not. It’s entirely possible with Rangnick giving his honest thoughts, Woodward out of the picture and ETH coming in, that we’re in for a ride back to being a somewhat competitive footballing side. You seem to want to shut that party down before it’s getting started.
 
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tenpoless said:
You too will be marginalized. Now go kiss Scholes or something you twitter react Andy.
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:lol:
If Lawlor had indeed been marginalised (possibly because of an unwillingness to embrace modern comms technology) then why has he been kept on until now? Surely it would have been better to pension him off generously?

So it looks like Murtough either:
  1. hadn’t a clue what was going on until it was spelled out to him by Ralf; or
  2. was well aware of it all but was prevented from doing anything about it by Woodward
1. = @devilish 2. = @Adnan - take your pick…

I’m Team @Adnan right now, but may well swap sides depending on how things go over the summer.
 
devilish said:
Moyes seem to have had an aversion to anything linked with SAF. LVG had his own way, Mou is a difficult man and by the time the Portuguese left we were starting the recruitment restructuring led by Murtough.
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Indeed. Wouldn’t it have been nice if the club* had established this before taking him on, and planned accordingly? The fact that everyone was so surprised when he got rid of the whole backroom team was a major sign that there had been no transition plan at all.

* and SAF, though I’m not inclined to blame him as it really wasn’t his job.
 
Ali Dia said:
Watch now as Lawlor goes to a rival and they become the new Dortmund. Let’s just hope Murtough actually knows what he’s at. It wouldn’t be like us to get an appointment right let alone lots of appointments. I’ve also read on here from one of our members (and I’ve suspected it myself) that the day to day running of the club is clunky and everything is kicked up to america and the time difference can leave people waiting around an extra day before making even the most simple calls.
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Joel Glazer certainly seems more involved than he used to be. Maybe because he and his siblings no longer had absolute confidence in Woodward.

With any luck things will start to go better under the new regime and he will feel able to back off again.
 
GDaly95 said:
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We’ve had a “marginalised” Chief Scout and Head of Global Scouting “for years” and apparently moving on from that scenario isn’t going to change anything.
 
Crashoutcassius said:
was Bout the guy LVG brought in to modernise the scouting dept? history repeats itself
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Nope. Opposition Scout.

Why he was kept on after the rest of LvG’s people were sacked is an interesting question. Obviously someone must have thought he was a Good Chap; maybe the role was created for him to justify his retention.

The one who should have been retained was Franz Hoek. De Gea stopped improving after he was sacked.
 
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