Scouting revolution

Adam Bate speaks to Hamburg scout Steven Houston about football's data analysis revolution.

The image of the wizened old scout stood in the cold scouring for talent at a provincial football ground remains. But like other facets of the game, scouting is changing. And technology is driving development. These days a football player is as likely to be discovered on a computer database several time-zones away as on wet and windy Tuesday at Tranmere. Hamburg chief technical scout Steven Houston is part of the new breed of modern scouts. Houston left Chelsea last year to join the backroom staff of former Blues sporting director Frank Arnesen and is the man charged with building the German club's scouting network. He believes the world of technical scouting is no longer seen as the preserve of the geeks but an essential part of the process. "I think we are winning the battle," Houston told Sky Sports. "When I started in 2008, technical scouting was a very new word. You were limited in terms of the products you could buy to help in that area. Now it's almost a mini-revolution in scouting where teams have technical scouts and are buying products that allow them to have coverage of various leagues. "It's definitely something that a lot of clubs are now paying attention to. I think the Premier League remains very innovative. If you look at the conferences now most of them have full attendance from Premier League clubs and from my point of view that's really exciting to see that kind of movement compared to 2008."

Efficiency

It's not that Houston regards traditional scouting methods as dead - far from it. Clubs still have to see the players in the flesh. But the old methods were not systematised and scouts could end up seeing certain clubs more often than others for a myriad of reasons that had nothing to do with the potential of the market. Efficiency is the name of the game. "Stats are central to how we work but you need great scouts," he explains. "You need them to watch players live. What technical scouting can do is allow you to be more efficient. Scouts can't watch every game; they can't watch every team. There are only so many resources you have and it's about trying to use those resources efficiently. Are we watching the right games and the right players? "For example, if we are looking to sign young players then why are we watching teams where the majority of the players are older? But it's also interesting to look at whether you are looking for the right type of player. You often hear teams saying they need a striker. Do they really need a striker? Are they really sure - does the data show that?" The public's appetite for greater football analysis appears to know no bounds as the popularity of companies such as Opta and websites like Zonal Marking continue to grow. Twenty years ago it would have been unusual to hear talk of assists. Now Leon Britton's pass completion rate is common knowledge. But for technical scouts like Houston even that is considered too basic. They must drill far deeper. "It's no longer a case of saying a player has scored X amount of goals or a midfielder has created X amount of assists," he adds. "You only have to look at something simple like a goal. There are so many types of goals - the difficulty of the goal, the quality of the goal. And with passes there are passes and then passes in the final third. We are now able to break down into it. The hardest thing is to work out what is important and what isn't important - at a