FM21: MONCHI MASTERCLASS — REMOVING THE LUCK FACTOR FROM RECRUITMENT.
I am certain that many of you would have already discovered the Monchi Masterclass, a series which can be found on YouTube. The 13 part series reveals the secrets of Sevilla’s Sporting Director in bitesize manageable chunks, each 13 minutes long in which he gives away his recruitment method/process for free, it has been consumed no fewer than 298,000 times.
Now if you opt to play FM like myself, delving deep into the depths of the game, looking to squeeze every drop of realism from Football Manager, I can guarantee that this blog is for you.
I will attempt to replicate the recruitment process for FM and in turn save you from 182 minutes of viewing, I would still 100 percent recommend watching the series as in my opinion it is pure gold.
There are five stages to go through before making a signing: watching players, selecting the targets, establishing the profile with the coach, negotiation and adaptation.
Each and every stage of this process is there for one main reason, to remove the luck factor and ensure that significant information is available to make the right choice.
The following blog will hopefully guide you on a recruitment journey which spans an entire season as we strive to secure the right player within our save.
The Basic Pillars
Just like any successful the Monchi Masterclass is built around three core principles, there core principles/values form the base on which all work built and are fundamental to its overall success.
Direction; all individuals within the club need to b geared towards the same success, goal or vision.
Planning: as stated above the recruitment philosophy has been built to remove the element of luck by providing as much information as possible. For this to happen successfully a roadmap is needed in terms of where the club wants to go (a long term vision) and the desire to improvise must be avoided.
Teamwork: it is fundamental to have a good team, the individuals within your circle need to be trusted
None of us are as good as us all together
In terms of FM the club direction is set by the board, however as you will know this can be negotiated or deviated away from.
In terms of teamwork, this is dependant on the strength of your recruitment team, in order to truly trust the information your scouts will be presenting you with you will need to have confidence in their ability to do their job.
The better the ability to judge player ability and potential the more you can rely on the information provided. As you can see from my team at OGC Nice we have that with no scout being under 16 for both attributes.
The story of the signing — Gross Tracking
Gross tracking occurs between the months of July to December, it’s sole purpose is to help populate the scouting database.
During this period scouts and analysts will watch football without any specific aim in which they will report back the following on a monthly basis.
- ideal XI each month per league (A) or across leagues (B)
- Selecting players from every league for every position
Scouts are assigned leagues from different classes to focus their efforts, this, in turn, helps to avoid duplication and ensures that no stone is left uncovered.
Our database is our treasure, the philosopher’s stone of the success of any planning
The allocations are based on the following tier system.
A = Top tier based on the profile of your club
B = Leagues of lesser quality
C= International/National Tournaments
Let’s take my save with OGC Nice for example, looking at the position of Ligue1 in the competition rankings you see that Ligue 1 is positioned in fifth place, making us a top tier side (A).
Applying this I would look to set up scouting assignments in the following way (above). Remember we are looking to just watch football at this stage of the process and therefore applying any filters/conditions to the scouting assignment is not necessary.
Due to the fact that Seville and Nice are limited in terms of scouting capacity the work of others is drawn upon to assist with tier B, instead of scouting lesser leagues the focus is towards scouting U21, U19 International teams from those nations which eliminates the need to deviate the focus from the top tier.
In FM I would suggest looking into the U21, U19 of national sides from countries who fall into this second-tier group and select players from those teams to be scouted on an individual basis. The general rule of thumb would lead you to prioritise players from clubs in tier A leagues over those from lesser tiers.
Finally, as and when International tournaments occur, even at youth level make sure you send a scout to track them for potential talent, these make up the final tier, tier C.
Completion of this phase at the end of December should leave you with a large database (907) of players, which we look to refine during the next stage of the process.
My tip would be to move all players on a monthly basis who have been scouted and have a recommendation score of over 75 (believed to be a very good addition to the squad) as this will help when moving towards the next phase of the process.
The story of the signing — Net Tracking
Here the focus is on providing as much information on the players identified during gross tracking, the next stage of the process spans across January — May.
The net tracking process consists of five important parts;
- Watching the players
- Tracking by different situations
- Tracking by different scouts
- Ranking Players (A-E)
- Creating a definitive list
Parts 1–3 revolve around watching the players in a range of different situations by different individuals, this information helps to paint a better picture of the player and again helps to remove the luck factor surrounding the signing. It is then used to rank the individuals which aid in creating the definitive list.
Above is what is meant by tracking in different situations, this can be replicated in FM under Staff>Responsibilities>Scouting where you can select the detail on what a scout will do when tracking a player.
As you can see, I have changed my settings to watch a player for three matches, this will guarantee that my scout will see the player operate both at home and away and likely that the strength of the opposition will vary.
If you want to replicate the Masterclass by the book then I would suggest creating a spreadsheet which you can update with multiple scout reports on each player. This would ensure part three (tracking by different scouts) is covered, the template could be as simple as the below.
As you can see I have only selected my most trusted scouts, the ones with the highest current/potential ability attributes. Ensuring that the teamwork basic pillar is adhered to as I need to be able to trust the information provided.
It is from this collection of data that we are able to produce an overall average score which we will call our ranking, thus meeting part four of the net tracking process.
This information will assist us in providing a definitive list of players that on paper would be a good fit for our club, we will explore how this list is finalised in the next section.
Fine Tuning
To aid selecting a player for the definitive list the following six parameters are used;
- Physical profile
- Technical profile
- Psychological profile
- Economic conditions
- Estimated time to settle in
- Future increase in value
Firstly drilling down into the first two parameters (Physical, Technical), the majority of this information is easily accessible on FM via the player attributes screen which captures the players score across a range of values which determines their profile.
You can also pull in information surrounding player traits and also use the information within the scout report to ensure you have a well-rounded understanding of the player.
Moving on to the psychological profile, like the above the mental attributes help to form a baseline for the individual. However, Football Manager does not spoon-feed you all the data to assess the personalities of players, you can however get an improved insight this by doing the following;
You can judge a players personality attributes by;
Interpreting a players personality and media handling style description using the information provided under personality descriptions and media handling style descriptions.
Personality information is also included in coach reports and scout reports
For the next parameter, Economic conditions, a feel for this can be obtained by holding a discussion with the players agent. Here you will gain insight into both the fee and also the players demands.
The final parameter surrounds the estimated time it would take for the individual to settle in.
If you are bringing a player in who isn’t a native from the country you are within you will also need to consider languages spoken, this will clearly impact the ability of the player to settle in especially if there isn’t players within the club who can speak the language.
This will also become a factor along with playing time which will help to place the individual within the social groups within your club.
Player Profiles
It at this stage that the process bottlenecks, here the manager sits down with to describe the exact type of player he is keen to bring to the club.
The lamp and the table theory
It is the player profile which ensures that the manager secures the exact type of player he desires, this Monchi discusses as the table and the lamp theory.
An example of this is given during Rafa Benitez time at Valencia, during a press conference he was asked “what do you think of the signing of Canobbio?”
He said, “Canobbio is a great player, an incredible player, but I asked for a wardrobe and they’ve brought me a bed.”
As you can see this doesn’t mean the player signed was bad, it just amplifies that the manager required a certain type of player and someone else was signed.
In order to successfully fine-tune on Football Manager you need to first understand what type of player you require. Do you have a DNA within your save? If so then filters will need to be run on the players identified during the net tracking stage, which will knock some targets off the definitive list.
It is at this stage that you will need to apply your own criteria to the shortlist filter, whether this by specific mental/physical or technical attributes, age or even nationality.
The Prime Target
Using the above Monchi Masterclass over the duration of a season in my OGC Nice save I have tracked the world in order to secure a striker with a similar mould Robert Lewandowski.
After conducting gross tracking the following shortlist was pulled together of all strikers aged 27 and under, which scouts identified as having a recommendation of over 70, these individuals were then moved onto the net tracking where they would be scouted by multiple individuals across multiple scenarios.
As you can see from the above table, each player has been watched by three scouts across January-May and I have scored an average recommendation for each player.
Applying the fine-tuning, I have made it clear that I would the definitive list to be a similar player to Lewandoski and therefore I have carried out the below activity to see how each player compares.
Looking at the above, the method behind the madness was to take each one of Lewandowski’s attributes which scored 15 and over (highlighted red). These were then added together to make an overall score, as you can see Robert scores 277 out of a potential top score of 320. This scoring formula was applied to all players within the sample and shows me which players are the most closely aligned to this year's Ballon d'Or winner.
This extra layer of data enables me to now have an overall scouting recommendation from the most trusted members of the recruitment team along with how these players fit with my desire.
As you can see the Masterclass process documented by Monchi certainly helps to reduce the element of luck surrounding the recruitment process and highlights the significant amount of work which sits behind the story of the signing.
Taking the above information into my save with OGC Nice, I have a transfer budget of £37 million, many of the players above fall outside of my reach both in terms of asking price and the fact that a move from a team with a higher reputation to little old Les Aiglons is not appealing.
Looking at the combined scoring system, we would like to sign a player with a combined scoring of above 75 and therefore are left with the following options;
Now that I have my definitive list, I looked into some of the traits and feedback from scout reports. Firstly, Schick has been flagged as being a fairly inconsistent performer who is susceptible to injuries, two factors which raise a red flag. Castrovilli is an interesting target, clearly not known for his ability to operate as a DLF, however when comparing his attributes to those needed in the role he scored 205 compared to Lewandowski’s 225. This would be an ideal signing for someone like Guido Merry who can be found over at Strikerless.com as he has experience in retraining players in relation to player roles.
Leaving me with a decision between Andre Silva or Dusan Vlahovic.
Casting an overview against the two individuals and their attribute profiles you will see that they both are very similar players, their radars are verging on being identically aligned.
Vlahovic aged 22, certainly has room to develop and also possesses the traits moves into channels and plays with back to goal, both are ideal for the role as a DLF. He also enjoys big matches and is a fairly consistent performer, this information is within the scout reports. On a negative note he will likely find it difficult in adapting easily into the core group of players.
Silva aged 27 is also is a fan of playing in big matches and his movement off the ball makes him a constant thorn in the side for defenders. He also has excellent levels of bravery and work rate, making him a great team player. Again, Silva may find it difficult to fit in with the core social group and has been flagged as being fairly susceptible to problems when living in another country.
The key factor in opting to sign Silva over Vlahovic is that Silva is in his prime, he will be able to hit the ground running with no need to invest time in his development. The squad already has a large percentage of it’s core aged 23 and under and I believe that signing a player of his calibre with significant experience and a proven track record of scoring goals in the Bundesliga will add significant value to the squad and impact results from the off.
Clearly this recruitment model will not be popular with some of the FM fanbase as due to the large amount of time it’s implementation consumes, then again for some of you, like myself this post will be right up your street and will hopefully fill you with even more satisfaction when a signing who you have tracked across the span of a year in the game commits to the club and turns out to be a success.
I hope you have enjoyed what has been my most in-depth blog post to date, again I would like to reiterate that if you have found this post of interest, please take the time out of your busy schedules to watch the original content created by Monchi himself, it really is an excellent series.
Magnus
