Uilleam

Transfers, then. And here are some thoughts from Mr Hamzah Khalique-Loonat, Football Data Journalist from The Times (or @Rousseau as he is known in this parish). Make of them what you will (and you will), but if only 50% of transfers are successful, perhaps we should not be too disappointed at lack of activity in the current window, or, indeed, in any window, for that matter. The seven reasons why half of all transfers end in failure With hundreds of millions now spent on risky signings, clubs have turned to AI and number analysis to predict who is likely to flop or thrive — and why Hamzah Khalique-Loonat, Football Data Journalist Monday February 03 2025, 9.00am, The Times https://www.thetimes.com/sport/football/article/why-transfers-fail-football-premier-league-deadline-day-j706qfxjt The transfer window shuts on Monday night and while Premier League clubs are not expected to break the £815million record spend from January 2023, Manchester City alone have already shelled out £125million as they seek to rebuild their squad and prepare for the remainder of an intense season. But the curious thing about transfers is that despite the enormous amount of money spent on them, many simply just don’t work out. In fact, the success rate is roughly 50 per cent which means new recruits are as likely to flop as they are to thrive. The reasons are plentiful and varied, anything from injury derailing a career to players falling out of favour with a manager, having difficulties settling in or even not liking the English weather. Ian Graham, the former director of research at Liverpool, set out the seven most common problems as follows: current player is better than the new player; the player is not as good as first thought; the player does not fit the style of the team; the player is played out of position; the manager does not rate the player; the player has fitness issues; the player has personal issues. If a club was 90 per cent confident in each of those elements being successful, once those probabilities are worked out you end up with a 48 per cent chance of overall success. Analysis by Plaier, a Hamburg-based football data consultancy, reinforced this point. It found that, on average, half of all new players in the Premier League appear for 540 or so minutes (or six matches of game time) before being moved on. This number includes every player that has at least one minute of playing time, taking in reserves and academy prospects called upon in tricky situations who would otherwise realistically not be regulars. Nonetheless, the number is enormous, especially when considering that wage and transfer expenditure are the biggest outlays for Premier League clubs, their importance heightened in the era of Profitability and Sustainability Rules. But is it possible to head off these issues before signing a player? Can clubs know for certain, or act with at least near certainty, that they are not buying a dud? Jan Wendt, the chief executive of Plaier, believes using data can help remove some of the uncertainty associated with buying players. “We don’t look just at one single player and have a look at his metrics and compare these. We also say, against whom was he playing and with whom was he playing?” he says. Measuring what players do is simple enough. Nowadays there is both event data (manually collected information that records every action by a player with the ball) and tracking data (automatically collected information captured by cameras, to document the actions of every player on the field at once) for clubs to work with. The answer, Wendt believes, is in a correlation engine — a computer tool which is designed to recognise patterns. “A correlation engine creates chunks out of data,” he says. “The AI runs them in parallel and selects the best tool with the highest accuracy; it guarantees that you always have the best outcome. “It’s not just used in football, it’s also used in other areas, for example, in aviation where it’s more professional — a matter of life and death if the system has a failure.” So how can this link back to football, specifically in terms of scouting and increasing the likelihood of transfers succeeding? “The first thing we can measure is a player’s performance, but we do not measure his capabilities as a player, we measure his efficiency in a system,” he says. “We do not care how well he dribbles or how well he shoots or how many goals he scores. That has no influence on the game itself. “We measure his contribution or, in definite terms, his efficiency in connection with 11 players and with other players playing 11 opponents home and away in a specific league. “All these things in itself have an influence on your own performance and your performance has an influence on this whole system with the 21 other players.” By doing this, Wendt hopes that clubs can be much smarter in their recruitment. They will be able to analyse and model what sort of players suit a specific tactical system and how they interact with team-mates — even down to the likelihood that a player will succeed in a different league or role. Soon, perhaps, that 50 per cent figure may start to rise.

RANGERS Football Club are today delighted to announce the signing of Lyall Cameron on a pre-contract agreement from Dundee. The 22-year-old midfielder has made over 100 appearances for the Dens Park side, impressing with his performances in the Scottish Premiership. Coming through the academy at Dundee, he made his debut for the club at just 16-years-old against Raith Rovers in 2019/20. Cameron has also been capped for Scotland at under-21 level. Technical Director, Nils Koppen said: “I am delighted that we have agreed a deal for Lyall to join the club and to continue his career at Rangers come the summer. He is a talented young player, who has already gained great experience in the Scottish Premiership, and adding young, Scottish talent to our first-team squad is hugely important to all of us at the club. “Lyall has a lot of potential and I look forward to seeing him continue to grow at Rangers in the coming years.” Cameron will join the club upon the expiry of his contract in the Summer.

It has been put to me that Bobby Clark was known to play outfield for Aberdeen, and, indeed, did so at Ibrox, as he had lost his place between the sticks to a fellow called Ernie McGarr.

Thanks, if thanks is appropriate, for this info. The tale of woe wot I heard was that he lost 5 in each of two matches against ENG. One was an SFA Centenary Challenge match, the other a Home International. Don't on any account, go to the bookies on this unverified story, mind.

Did he not lose hunners of goals v ENG in two games, back to back, in the early 1970s. Or was that somebody else?

I fear that today will bring some 'close, but no cigar' type intel. demonstrating that the Club tried, but, alas, could meet the demands of neither the Pomeranian, thunderbooted, defensive midfield striker, not his compatriot the goal scoring goalkeeper. I will be delighted if I am wrong, and we sign even a demi-panatela; or two.

I was thinking of his experience in Damascus (?), at the hands of the Turks.

Doubtful, but perhaps not so improbable as him accepting an offer from a Turkish outfit.

He'll surface in Arabia, soon enough......

Czech mate, Lenny

Raskin, who played well, and got what I think was a vital opening goal.

From The Guardian: Vaclav Cerny says Rangers feel at home in Europe after qualifying for the last 16 of the Europa League with a 2-1 win over Union Saint-Gilloise last night. Rangers, whose erratic domestic form this season has all-but handed the title to their Old Firm rivals Celtic, held on for the win that took them to eighth place – avoiding the playoffs. Philippe Clement’s side were joined in the last 16 by earlier opponents Lyon, Olympiacos, Manchester United and Tottenham and, asked if European football suited Rangers, Cerny, on loan from Wolfsburg, said:

I can't vouch for this, but it came winging, comet-like, to me, through the ether, so it must have have some authenticity. Surely? Maybe? Just under £9m so far in prize money alone. Not accounting for tv money and ticket sales. Not sure what we clear per home game after overheads, £1.5-2m something like that maybe, anyone have a more accurate number? Europa League prize money Winner : £10.95m Runner-up : £5.9m Semi-finalists : £3.54m Quarter-finalists : £2.11m Round of 16 : £1.47m Reaching knockout round play-off : £250k League-phase wins : £379k League-phase draws : £126k League-phase defeats : £0 How much have Rangers banked so far? Taking the above numbers into account, Rangers have already boosted their transfer kitty courtesy of this year's revamped competition. Gers got £3.64m just from qualifying and topped up their prize money with performance-related bonuses. Wins over Malmo, FCSB, Nice and USG swelled the coffers by around £1.5m, with draws against Olympiacos and Tottenham adding another £252k to the pot - which totalled £1.768m. Malmo 0-2 Rangers (£379k) Rangers 1-4 Lyon (£0) Rangers 4-0 FCSB (£379k) Olympiacos 1-1 Rangers (£126k) Nice 1-4 Rangers (£379k) Rangers 1-1 Tottenham (£126k) Manchester United 2-1 Rangers (£0) Rangers 2-1 USG (£379k) Total: £1.768m How much has Rangers league position earned them? Rangers will also be due another chunky sum from UEFA for their final finishing position of eighth. Each position in the table is worth £63.4k, meaning the club that finishes 36th will earn that figure with an additional £63.4k added for every position higher - and the high-flying Gers have therefore netted a tasty £1.775m For making it automatically into the last 16 Rangers know that they will earn at least an additional £1.47m as well as £252,800 add-on for being in the top, meaning that the league stage campaign in total has earned the Ibrox club more than £5m in bonus money. On top of the £3.64m earned just for making it into the main competition. All of that adds up to a grand total of £8.905m - without including ticket sales from four home matches, and for what promises to be a sell-out crowd for the last 16 match regardless of who the opponents are.

For those of an analogue disposition The Europa League draw in full Ferencvaros v Viktoria Plzen Porto v Roma Winners to play Lazio or Athletic Bilbao in round of 16 Twente v Bodø/Glimt Fenerbahce v Anderlecht Winners to play Olympiacos or Rangers in round of 16 Union SG v Ajax PAOK v FCSB Winners to play Lyon or Eintracht Frankfurt in round of 16 AZ Alkmaar v Galatasaray Midtjylland v Real Sociedad Winners to play Manchester United and Tottenham in round of 16 The seeded team, named first, will play at home in the second leg. First legs will be played on 13 February, with the second legs a week later.

We need to buck up, tout de suite Dr

And I thought you were an East Coaster.....

Whose side are you on, boy? Whose side are you on?

Dessers was onside.

Two offsides, thankfully, but we are sloppy, and look like we are getting sloppier

Some legacy, the more cynical might conclude. Provided that Mr Pooley is instructed to apply his science to Soccerball, and not to Okkerball, then we can hope.

Aaaah, Tottenham......whose sick bay is as big as -might even be bigger than- that of Rangers. Bodes well.

Hannover? If there is a football club in Hamelin, we must establish contact immediately, and arrange for a loan of The Pied Piper. Clearly only he could charm our recalcitrant 'stars' to follow him down the M8, and onto a private jet, destination Whodafuckcares. Mmmmm.....What's Gazza up to these days?

Stats, schmats, Dessers fails the eyesight test. Here's an observation from Matthew Benham, owner of Brentford: "When I look at a centre forward, the first question I ask is not how many goals he's scored, but to what degree he improves the team". (Matthew Alexander Benham is a British businessman who is the owner of English Premier League club Brentford. He is also the founder and owner of Smartodds, a statistical research company for professional gamblers, and owner of Matchbook betting exchange. A graduate of Oxford University in physics who worked in finance in the City of London, he is widely known for his unorthodox data analytics-driven approach to decision-making in football. This guy is no mug, and worth a listen.) Now, the Norwegian striker, Erling Haaland, is often criticised for his general play, and work around the paddock, but excused because 'he scores goals'. Here is a stat: In the five seasons before he joined, the team scored an average of 97 goals/ season. In two full seasons with Haaland, they average 95 goals. Make of that what you will.