Football like every other sport is big business, and football business cut across many professions and practices. The most popular professionals in football are the main actors. The footballers and the managers. There is sports journalism which is also a multi-billion pounds business. There are physios, Coaches, football administrators and even the tech guys.
There are football agents too who are the busiest during the transfer windows. There are scouts too whose job usually goes under the radar as they are not as popular as others in the footballing world. Scouts are arguably the most important people in football, they travel the world round looking for some diamonds in the dirt. Everyone knows all the biggest football stars now but scouts are those who identified them at a tender age before the limelight.
How to Get Scouted for a Pro-Football Team?
Basically, the major job of a scout is to watch as many matches as possible with the aim of discovering as many talents as he can. There are thousands of scouts around the globe and scouts are a constant fixture in all professional matches, giants like Real Madrid and Manchester United have hundreds of scouts scattered around the world as they plan to stay ahead of rivals by catching them young.
Scouting reports are the reports of scouts on player/players they have scouted detailing their strengths and weaknesses. Scouts generally classify player into different attributes:
- Physical condition
- Mental strength
- Technique or technical ability
- Tactical awareness
Physical ability includes:
- Build
- Pace
- Stamina
- Strength
Mental strength includes how you manage adversity, your attitude on the pitch, win lose or draw, concentration level, ability to take responsibilities e.g Captain responsibility and set piece responsibility especially from 12 yards away. Player’s technical ability includes shooting technique, passing technique, crossing accuracy and set piece technique.
Tactical ability includes interpretation of roles, off the ball movement, specialty, and versatility. A footballer hoping to get scouted for a pro football team, college or club team must first identify his strengths and ensure he shows it every time he steps on the pitch. Sometimes scouts are scouting for a particular quality and attribute.
Therefore any of the 22 players on the pitch who shows such quality the most or best will be recognized by the scout and re-scouted again or get recommended immediately for a pro football team. Furthermore, regardless of your technical ability, there are some attributes a footballer player who is trying to impress a scout should imbibe in, this includes teamwork, selflessness, work rate, body language and attitude whether things are going right or wrong for the team.
Jobs in a Football Team
Football clubs especially the mega clubs are institutions with hundreds of staff, further divided into playing staff and non-playing staff. Playing staff include members of the senior team, the Under 23s, Under 21s, Under 17s. Under 13s and under 10s are usually classified as academy players.
Non-playing includes the boss, who is the gaffer and usually referred to as manager and is responsible for all footballing decisions. The technical team also includes the assistant manager, the first team coach whose job is to train and prepare the team for the games ahead. Rarely, some managers take charge of training themselves without delegating, such managers are referred to as managers with the โhands onโ approach. There are nutritionists who advise the team on what to eat and what not to eat.
Another prominent job on the team is that of the physio, who is responsible for the well being of the team by helping keeping them fit and avoiding injuries as well as treatment and management of existing injuries. There is also the technical director who is responsible for non footballing decisions especially the acquisition of new playing staff. There are scouts whose responsibilities have been explained earlier.