Paul Mitchell: Southampton talent chief to join Tottenham

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Nutter-Naylor

Nutter-Naylor

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30082201

Southampton's head of recruitment Paul Mitchell is set to join Tottenham Hotspur, reports BBC Radio Solent.
Mitchell, 33, has handed in his notice and is expected to link up with former Saints manager Mauricio Pochettino.
Spurs, who have spent £135 million in the last 18 months, are currently 12th in the Premier League table and trail leaders Chelsea by 15 points.
Mitchell joined Saints in 2012 after doing the same job at MK Dons following his early retirement because of injury.
He will be responsible for identifying new talent at Spurs following a busy summer of recruitment with Southampton after they lost key players.
Among the players Saints brought in were Graziano Pelle, Dusan Tadic, Sadio Mane and Toby Alderweireld.
Saints lie second in the league, just four points behind Chelsea following their recent 2-0 victory over Leicester.
 
The whole setup down there at Southampton should be what Levy is trying to establish not just hand picking individuals like Pochettino and Mitchell. That could be what is going on in the background none of us are privy to that. The likes of Bale, Schniederlin, Lallana and the 2 goons were produced long before Mitchell and Pochettino were around
 
If you do not have the money to compete with the top level teams then you need to be elite behind the scenes. Scouting, analytics, youth development, focus on market inefficiencies, and general innovation should be massive focuses at Spurs. We will never be able to have long terms success trying to follow the same blueprint as Chelsea or City do. Unfortunately, Spurs seem to have ignored these facts for whatever reason and seem to in general be the opposite of innovative.

It has pretty much now been proven with in American sports with moneyball (though that is a massively reductive term for what currently exists across all sports), with Monchi at Sevilla, what Southampton has done with their youth system, and numerous other examples that being innovative and focused procuring knowledge can help overcome monetary deficiencies to some extent.

The problem with Spurs is they combine being cheap with also being simple in their thinking which creates a horrible dichotomy. I'm desperate for Spurs to invest more in intelligent scouting, do some work to see if they can find a viable use for analytics in football, and just be innovative and try some different things. We've clearly reaped some of the rewards of having an innovator like Ricardo Moniz work in our youth system. I don't know if Mitchell is the answer to these problems but at least he was part of a thoughtful system at Southampton. Also, bringing back someone who is as respected as Broomfield seems to be a good choice.

Having our football decisions made by a businessman like Levy and someone who only seems fit for negotiating like Baldini is a travesty and it has manifested itself like such. Our business over the past few seasons seems to have been handled with the tact and intelligence of the average sky sports panel of dross ex-pros.

Hopefully the addition of the likes of Broomfield and Mitchell shows a progression of our decision makers towards innovative and different thinking than what the club has been doing recently. If we're to try to ascend the mountainous gap of the richer teams ahead of us it will be because of the ability of the football minds we have behind the scenes. Hopefully, this is the type of addition (and maybe a few more) that can reinvigorate the football decision making at the club.
 
"We've seen before and heard quotes from managers that have probably perception-wise based their acquisition on the two games they've played against that player in the Premier League or the Football League," explained Mitchell. "I work off a very simple theory of I had one good game once, but I think the 80 other times I played I wasn't so good."



We've done this so many times over the years.........
 
Why is Moreno suddenly the answer to all our prayers he is a six-foot Mexican who may not speak English coming off a bad injury. He's never played here before he could just be another vlad
 
Honestly, vlaar and Jonny Evans would be better than vlad and Kaboul. players like Milner, Lescott, Barry would've cost 18 million between them, yet we get fazio and paulinho instead. they're not 'ardiles-like' like in their style/stature our fans wont except it. when are we gonna realise that we just need a base and then sign one proven name per window to improve ourselves over a few years?
 
1882 said:
Ohh-ohhhh, we're at it again...
Poaching another club's one-season wonder...
when the fuck will we learn??
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The story of Tottenham Hotspur FC

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Andrew said:
More like they've been building the sandcastle below the high tide mark for half the day...

Or more like one kid didn't tell the others that they were actually building not with sand but a cheaper alternative. Only discovering this fact as the somewhat caustic bargain substance blew too easily in the wind and lodged in their eyelids and netherparts. And as the burning sensation subsided the other two pondered why he bothered being thrifty in the first place, as he was paying them both more pocket money than they'd seen in their short lifetimes to build the thing.
But wisely, they pondered in silence as the third boy simply smiled and returned to the shop for more sand.
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Some other kid had his sand castle near which meant that we couldn't expand our sand castle so Levy burnt the kids sand castle down.
 
Yorkshire_Spurs said:
Southampton signings this summer (I would imagine he was involved in them as it is his job...):

Shane Long (Hull City, £12m),
Dusan Tadic (FC Twente, £10.9m),
Fraser Forster (Celtic, £10m)
Sadio Mane (Red Bull Salzburg, £10m)
Graziano Pelle (Feyenoord, £9m)
Florin Gardos (Steaua Bucharest, £6m) (Barely played)
Saphir Taider (Inter Milan, Swap) (Out on loan)
Ryan Bertrand (Chelsea, Loan)
Toby Aldeweireld (Atlético Madrid, Loan).
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I had read he was also in charge of reviewing the club's players as well, so building a profile of the squad (sort of reverse scouting I guess), which would mean probably he looked at who would work as a replacement, vs. who wouldn't. Also, probably looking at the youth squad and seeing who was ready to step up.
 
Aussie Ardiles said:
Hit: JayRod, Davis, Clyne, Lovren, Wanyama, Tadic, Forster, Mane, Bertrand & Alderwireld
Miss: Gazzaniga, Mayuka, Yoshida, Forren, Taider, Osvaldo, Gaston Ramirez

Excluded Pelle as he was clearly a Koeman buy, Long who can do a job and Gardos who it's too early to tell. Like I said the 10 out of 17 success rate is good for us, it's just a worry when he goes for more top-end talent it doesn't work out. Those 2 in bold were supposedly linked to us before signing for Southampton that should have scared him off recommending them.
:adegrin:
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You're looking at is as if he was the guy doing the negotiating and signing. I think this guy's role was much more putting together profiles of targets. So, he didn't pick just these guys, he had lists, and these were the guys Soton managed to get, from the list. So, we may need to think about him differently than the headline narrative of the media.
 
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