SCOUTING SECRETS: KEY TRAITS SCOUTS SEEK IN SOCCER PLAYERS
Soccer is the most widely practiced sport in the world. Children are kicking balls around at any time, in any place on the globe. These children may someday become future stars.
Every soccer player dreams of being discovered by a scout.
When I was a child, I wasn’t allowed to bring a ball to school, so during recess, I would make a makeshift ball using the metallic paper that wrapped my lunch, a stone, or a bag—whatever I could find to create a ball. We used it to play impromptu matches in imaginary spaces with two makeshift goals. We dedicated hours and hours to our favorite sport. One day, a friend from school invited us to try out for Athletic Club de Bilbao, and we were chosen. He wasn’t a scout per se, but he must have seen something in us. Time and the team proved him right, and we ended up at Lezama, the Athletic Club de Bilbao’s youth academy.
How do scouts work nowadays?
Today, scouts are generally former top-level footballers who, due to their experience, can identify talent. Major teams have scouts working on every continent in the world, and there are even funded schools that work with promising players before inviting them to join the football club.
In different phases, these scouts and their technical teams sift through players, and once they have passed several levels, the most promising players are offered contracts or professional deals.
What is more important, a player’s technical quality or their emotional intelligence?
So, what does a professional club look for in a player to find him interesting? Simply put, technical quality and, above all, emotional intelligence—that something that will enable a player to develop his talent to the highest level for the longest possible time. It is inherent but also something that can be cultivated. Coming with it “from the factory” would be ideal, but evaluating it is very complex, and that is what the technical teams of teams around the world try to decipher. Messi is an example of a star who has remained a top player for a decade. Perhaps we should ask his discoverer what he valued on the day he found him.
