Manchester United name John Murtough as Football Director and Darren Fletcher as Technical Director

[Foxbatt]

It wasn't really though was it, I mean, you literally referred to Michael Carrick and Mike Phelan... who'd both won multiple titles as players/coaches at Utd.... as "uninspiring" when compared to Carlos Queiroz, who'd won the square root of feck all before he joined Utd.... you seem a bit lost.

feck they were uninspiring as players too. McLaren didn't win anything before he came as coach to SAF. Carrick nor Phelan won anything before they came to United as players. Carlos ands McLaren instantly changed the dynamics according to SAF. A good leader knows to how to select good subordinates.
As for Carlos, he won the Cup with CP and also wrote the Q Report for Soccer USA and is a Graduate from Lisbon University. He is no middle of the road guy who happened to be a football manager.

 

[sglowrider]

Yep.

How you feel about this entirely depends on how well you think the restructuring of our academy and scouting system have gone in recent years.

If you think it's been a success (as the club do) then it's presumably a positive that the apparent architect of it is being given more responsibility and authority to continue developing the club in that direction.

If you don't think it has been particularly successful then we've just moved people who were already here around to little effect. Though even then you might think that surrounding our chief negotiator with more support is a plus.

The appointment is fundamentally based on the idea that the club was already on the right path and just needed to accelerate that rather than needing to bring in any outsiders to change things. You either buy that or you don't.

Plus if you look at it from a CEO's perspective. Then it makes logical sense. Who are we? We are a club that relies on its history/tradition, a brand that consists of growing out own youth players and a certain style of playing -- not necessarily a sophisticated style but one of attack.
We had to then fix the youth system first. And then ensure we have a pathway for the lads to grow into.

If we get some trendy DOF, he will bring his own team in and they may want to go for quick results rather than a mid to long term approach which Woodward seems to be undertaking at the moment. Clearly, Woodward is pleased with the current academy trajectory. It also indicates his number 1 priority for the club. Murtough and his past experiences with the academy -- and Fletcher as an academy product. The one-two punch for recruiting kids and building for the mid-long term.

There are some lessons learnt from this decision to bring in Murtough and Fletch for Woodward and his past/failed hires.

 

[yo@Kirk]

It will be interesting to see how the new structure and personnel deal with the deadwood and want aways.

 

[Dargonk]

Structure wise, it seems like a good change. Though no idea if we have the right people in the Job or not. John appears to have experience at least, but is stepping up into the role. No idea what Fletcher has achieved to warrant his position though. That one feels like an old boys club appointment, but hopefully he does well.

 

[Mindhunter]

Structure wise, it seems like a good change. Though no idea if we have the right people in the Job or not. John appears to have experience at least, but is stepping up into the role. No idea what Fletcher has achieved to warrant his position though. That one feels like an old boys club appointment, but hopefully he does well.

He has the unique quality of not disagreeing with the current CEO on anything. This seems like a way to keep everyone happy, including the fans.

 

[Gasolin]

He has the unique quality of not disagreeing with the current CEO on anything. This seems like a way to keep everyone happy, including the fans.

I thought Murtough was involved in the creation and improvement of the women's team? I'll trust Ole on that one. I think it's very good Ed is no more contacted by anyone in the footballing world for transfers. That's putting back football people who care about the club from a footballing perspectives in football positions. It's exactly why I am a big fan of Ole, those structural changes will pay.

 

[sglowrider]

I thought Murtough was involved in the creation and improvement of the women's team? I'll trust Ole on that one. I think it's very good Ed is no more contacted by anyone in the footballing world for transfers. That's putting back football people who care about the club from a footballing perspectives in football positions. It's exactly why I am a big fan of Ole, those structural changes will pay.

100%. You only have to ask why Woodward select the two and it will reflect Woodward's priorities.

 

[Hellboy]

So he’s been directly responsibly for the recent development of our youth recruitment (which has been incredible - possibly the best in the world?) and the creation of the women’s team - again a real positive for the club over the last few years. He’s also been here since 2014.
Thats good enough credentials for me.

As for Fletcher - he’s an intelligent guy and I have no doubts he can present the vision and history of Manchester United to potential signings. Listening to his analysis, you can tell he has a real knowledge and passion for the game.

You reckon him being here since 2014 is actually a good thing ?

Fletcher was only a youth coach last year and now is propulsed to a role of technical director does that make sense ?

This club is ruled by fools

 

[Nori-]

How underwhelming.

We have been linked to some of the most exciting football directors in Europe. Guys who have transformed clubs.

We've have had years to get this right and we go for........John Murtough. Someone whose been at the club the whole time and will basically get a job title change.

No ambition from these owners.

 

[Hellboy]

How underwhelming.

We have been linked to some of the most exciting football directors in Europe. Guys who have transformed clubs.

We've have had years to get this right and we go for........John Murtough. Someone whose been at the club the whole time and will basically get a job title change.

No ambition from these owners.

Exactly seems like a lot of people are just happy the vacations are being filled without actually analyzing the situation

 

[ti vu]

Pedantic and not actually very interesting


What gives you this impression? Isn't DoF always below the CEO/President at every football club? They don't actually run the entire club you do realize?

My post replied to the series of tweets, which said this new Football Director of ours, is not the boss of Ole's head coach/ manager role. So without that authority, it still requires executive level above hand on intervene if something went wrong with the coaching department. The DOF role supposed to have authority over the manager.

 

[Lukaku's first touch#]

The cynic in me can't helpt but think there's something in Woodward appointing a football director, as opposed to a director of football.

Is it not the same?

 

[devilish]

In some ways its a move to the right direction as we've got more football people taking football decisions. On the other hand I can't help to think that these appointments are meant to maintain as much status quo as possible. Neither Woodward's camp nor Ole's camp will ever feel challenged by a Moyes man and a guy with 50 hours coaching in him.

 

[Interval]

Atleast there's a human there as Vs thin air as was the case till recently.

I guess the reason why most don't like it, and I see the point, is that it seems like rewarding the system that has produced the last seven years of comical recruitments. Most wanted a change to that.

 

[elmo]

Plus if you look at it from a CEO's perspective. Then it makes logical sense. Who are we? We are a club that relies on its history/tradition, a brand that consists of growing out own youth players and a certain style of playing -- not necessarily a sophisticated style but one of attack.
We had to then fix the youth system first. And then ensure we have a pathway for the lads to grow into.

If we get some trendy DOF, he will bring his own team in and they may want to go for quick results rather than a mid to long term approach which Woodward seems to be undertaking at the moment. Clearly, Woodward is pleased with the current academy trajectory. It also indicates his number 1 priority for the club. Murtough and his past experiences with the academy -- and Fletcher as an academy product. The one-two punch for recruiting kids and building for the mid-long term.

There are some lessons learnt from this decision to bring in Murtough and Fletch for Woodward and his past/failed hires.

It's basically just a move to appease the fans and show them that there's someone else to blame for our transfer feck ups and to save money by doing an internal promotion over getting someone who's specialized in being an actual DOF.

And Fletcher suddenly being promoted to technical director when he has barely started working as a coach is hilarious. It's nearly as bad as how Pirlo got the Juventus job.

 

[devilish]

Atleast there's a human there as Vs thin air as was the case till recently.

I guess the reason why most don't like it, and I see the point, is that it seems like rewarding the system that has produced the last seven years of comical recruitments. Most wanted a change to that.

We also have the most inexperienced football people at top level. Ole was already inexperienced as he is then you got the likes of Mckenna, Carrick, Fletcher as Technical director and Murtough is covering a new and important role himself. That on top of two bankers trying to meddle in football affairs as well (Judge and Woodward). It seems that this club has an aversion towards experience, meritocracy and new ideas.

 

[devilish]

It's basically just a move to appease the fans and show them that there's someone else to blame for our transfer feck ups and to save money by doing an internal promotion over getting someone who's specialized in being an actual DOF.

And Fletcher suddenly being promoted to technical director when he has barely started working as a coach is hilarious. It's nearly as bad as how Pirlo got the Juventus job.

It is. Pirlo can at least rely on an experienced team both on and off the pitch (Paratici, Nedved, Agnelli and co).

 

[Isotope]

It wasn't really though was it, I mean, you literally referred to Michael Carrick and Mike Phelan... who'd both won multiple titles as players/coaches at Utd.... as "uninspiring" when compared to Carlos Queiroz, who'd won the square root of feck all before he joined Utd.... you seem a bit lost.

SAF brought in coaches when he thought the ones he had weren't adequate. Coaches with different experiences. Even when SAF was already winning trophies.

Now if you think Ole has that already in place, fair do.

 

[devilish]

SAF brought in coaches when he thought the ones he had weren't adequate. Coaches with different experiences. Even when SAF was already winning trophies.

Now if you think Ole has that already in place, fair do.

Sir Alex brought people from outside to inject new ideas. He risked proper revolts because of that (Keane vs Queroz is public knowledge). I can't help thinking that United are becoming far too insular at times.

 

[devilish]

Could you give us any example of big clubs that hires 'specialist' DOF and become very successful? The only two I remember in recent times are Arsenal that hired Mislintat and Roma that hired Monchi and don't think those two are success stories

So you think promoting someone who have successfully revamped our scouting network and academy to higher position in the club is not actual change we needed?

I don't know much about Mislintat but Monchi was set to fail. Roma was in a financial mess. Roma expected Monchi to sell off most of the crown jewels immediately, buy cheap knock outs as replacement and immediately be successful in the process. Imagine if we ordered Murtough to sell Bruno, Rashford, Pogba, Shaw, Maguire and Martial and then give him 50m to replace them and still expect the team to do well.

 

[Isotope]

Sir Alex brought people from outside to inject new ideas. He risked proper revolts because of that (Keane vs Queroz is public knowledge). I can't help thinking that United are becoming far too insular at times.

That's how he evolved over time, while others just left behind by their obsolete ideas. All best top people do that.

 

[devilish]

That's how he evolved over time, while others just left behind by their obsolete ideas. All best top people do that.

exactly. That was his secret. Sir Alex's brilliance laid in his superb man management not in his tactics. Tactics wise he was great but not brilliant. In fact he didn't develop a ground breaking football system as Pep (tika taka), Sacchi and Cruyff did. However Sir Alex was superb street wise. He understood that football tend to change and eventually every tactic ends up obsolete. Hence why he surrounded himself with the best people he could get his hands on, people who challenged his way of football and who brought new ideas in.

Returning to the subject I think that this 'setting' was a compromise between the football people and the money people. There's no way that a top DOF or a top technical director would have accepted to work with the likes of Judge negotiating deals on their behalf. Its like asking a head coach to focus only on strikers and midfielders while someone else coach defenders and goalkeepers.

 

[Skills]

If that Athletic hierarchy is to be trusted, the management team responsible for signing players at United includes:

• The Football Director
• The Manager
• The Director of Football Negotiations
• The Head of Recruitment Operations
• The Managers Personal Scout
• The Head of Global Scouting
• The Technical Chief Scout
• The Chief Scout

That's without considering any involvement Woodward, Butt or Fletcher might have, or the teams of people who fall under each of these positions.

That's only for now. Once Solskjaer gets sacked/moved on, that structure will get streamlined and the managers title will be downgraded to a head coach and his personal scout will be fecked off as part of it.

Once that happens, that's not an unreasonable amount of people involved in decisions involving 100s of million pounds per season.

 

[Member 105568]

I thought Murtough was involved in the creation and improvement of the women's team? I'll trust Ole on that one. I think it's very good Ed is no more contacted by anyone in the footballing world for transfers. That's putting back football people who care about the club from a footballing perspectives in football positions. It's exactly why I am a big fan of Ole, those structural changes will pay.

Women's team doesn't really matter though. Fergie thought it was a distraction, didn't he? Murtaugh seems to have done great with recruiting at youth level though. I can't help but feel United are taking the "United man" approach a bit far though. I think it's generally a good thing but a few different views on the training ground or in recruitment would not be a bad thing. Quieroz and Meulensteen didn't do Fergie any hard, did they?

Fletcher must be doing less training now, perhaps there's room to recruit someone there...

 

[sveisa]

Can someone help me understand what a technical director does?

 

[Champagne Football]

Seems to be many who are writing this appointment off before it's even started.

There's every chance it could be a success. 2 blokes who know the club inside out, and what a wonderkid with Utd DNA looks like.

 

[sglowrider]

Sir Alex brought people from outside to inject new ideas. He risked proper revolts because of that (Keane vs Queroz is public knowledge). I can't help thinking that United are becoming far too insular at times.

But that was Fergie in the later stages of his career. He had a fairly generic team, people he was comfortable with at the start -- like Archie Knox, Jim Ryan and Brian Kidd. It was only later in his career he started to bring in external folks.

 

[Water Melon]

Let us wait until January next year before we start making any conclusions. Summer transfer window plus half of the new season may give a better indication of where we are heading to.

 

[::sonny::]

Doesn’t change nothing

Fletch hired 1 Month ago as a staff for trainings.

 

[devilish]

But that was Fergie in the later stages of his career. He had a fairly generic team, people he was comfortable with at the start -- like Archie Knox, Jim Ryan and Brian Kidd. It was only later in his career he started to bring in external folks.

Knox was a manager in his own right at Dundee while kidd managed Preston. Don't forget that football was far smaller in terms of industry then it is now. Also even back then Sir Alex was a far better manager then Ole is

 

[::sonny::]

 

[Matriac]

This thread is mostly just full of fans who have no idea how a football club, or a business, is run.

A DOF isn't the boss of a manager at other clubs either. They work together on different areas of responsibility to make the club the best possible it can be.

The Manager handles the day to day work and improvement of the first team, while the DOF looks at more long-term development of the club as a whole, in tandem with the manager to help ensure that the long-term development will fit into what the manager will need for his day to day in a year or more, but thinking of the club first and not purely what the manager wants.

Now if there's a total clash between them, the DOF might raise concerns to the CEO who is likely to discuss it with the board. If they think the current results delivered by the manager is substandard, and looks unlikely to improve any time soon, with the added weight of the DOF's reasoning for why the long-term development strategy will continue to crash with the manager. Then the board is likely to fire the manager, and the DOF will present the CEO with candidates for manager that will work with the long-term plans. They will likely interview candidates together but the CEO makes the final call on who will be presented to the board for approval. (It's common in business to have a person you will work alongside with co-interview you with both your boss.)


As for complaints about too many scouts with similar sounding titles.
I don't even know for certain, but an educated guess from comparing rolenames in other businesses is:

Chief Scout - The direct report boss of all our scouts on payroll that goes out physically to watch games for players we are interested in.

Chief Technical Scout - The direct report boss of all our data analysts that spends time going through data from games, trainings and so on.

Head of Global Scouting - The person responsible for working with all the other scouting networks around the world that we collaborate with. We don't have scouts directly employed at all levels around the world, but this guy gets reports on players from youth level in South America or Siberian Tundra or whatever.

Then you have their boss who collates it all together, helping the departments on day to day what their needs are, and presents the findings to the DOF who discusses with the manager about possible players to buy.
Often the manager already has a shopping list of players he thinks will work in the team, and the DOF manages this down the scouting structure until reports are back up that can be discussed with the manager if the scouting team and DOF agrees with the manager that we should attempt to sign some of these players.
The manager's personal scout is for when Ole is extra interested in certain players, so Ole directs where he goes, and he reports to Ole for him to have extra talking points, but ultimately answers to the total scouting structure if we are to move on certain players.

 

[Mainoldo]

Dont project your knowledge of footballers on to other people, especially professional footballers.

Google exists as well btw, if they’re unsure of who Fletcher is all they have to do is google his name before they speak to him to see that he’s won everything there is to win as a player.

Sorry you’re right.. they can.

Imagine when they YouTube him

 

[Grande]

This is a good post. Rather than what I have read on here, gives a good insight.

He has also been part of the womens team I believe? they have made some good signings too?

Look at our youth set up today, there are signs that there is a philosophy in the different age groups.

For me, if he can improve our squad then I am all for it.

He played LB after Alex Greenwood went to Lyon, maybe? Bad joke ... I didn’t know he had worked with the womens team as well, is it something you know?

If he was a part of twisting the Glazers arm to ensure we got our womens team back up, I’m already a fan.

 

[Matriac]

He played LB after Alex Greenwood went to Lyon, maybe? Bad joke ... I didn’t know he had worked with the womens team as well, is it something you know?

If he was a part of twisting the Glazers arm to ensure we got our womens team back up, I’m already a fan.

It was in several articles yesterday that he was basically the one in charge of setting up our womens team. Don't know if he hired Casey, but probably had input. Then worked with her to identify and sign players and whatever other structure around the team was needed to get it up running so fast as it did.

 

[Inigo Montoya]

People wanted someone with pedigree, not a couple of inexperienced yes men who have done nothing in football management ...

Then get a dog

State of this place

 

[JPRouve]

This thread is mostly just full of fans who have no idea how a football club, or a business, is run.

A DOF isn't the boss of a manager at other clubs either. They work together on different areas of responsibility to make the club the best possible it can be.

The Manager handles the day to day work and improvement of the first team, while the DOF looks at more long-term development of the club as a whole, in tandem with the manager to help ensure that the long-term development will fit into what the manager will need for his day to day in a year or more, but thinking of the club first and not purely what the manager wants.

Now if there's a total clash between them, the DOF might raise concerns to the CEO who is likely to discuss it with the board. If they think the current results delivered by the manager is substandard, and looks unlikely to improve any time soon, with the added weight of the DOF's reasoning for why the long-term development strategy will continue to crash with the manager. Then the board is likely to fire the manager, and the DOF will present the CEO with candidates for manager that will work with the long-term plans. They will likely interview candidates together but the CEO makes the final call on who will be presented to the board for approval. (It's common in business to have a person you will work alongside with co-interview you with both your boss.)


As for complaints about too many scouts with similar sounding titles.
I don't even know for certain, but an educated guess from comparing rolenames in other businesses is:

Chief Scout - The direct report boss of all our scouts on payroll that goes out physically to watch games for players we are interested in.

Chief Technical Scout - The direct report boss of all our data analysts that spends time going through data from games, trainings and so on.

Head of Global Scouting - The person responsible for working with all the other scouting networks around the world that we collaborate with. We don't have scouts directly employed at all levels around the world, but this guy gets reports on players from youth level in South America or Siberian Tundra or whatever.

Then you have their boss who collates it all together, helping the departments on day to day what their needs are, and presents the findings to the DOF who discusses with the manager about possible players to buy.
Often the manager already has a shopping list of players he thinks will work in the team, and the DOF manages this down the scouting structure until reports are back up that can be discussed with the manager if the scouting team and DOF agrees with the manager that we should attempt to sign some of these players.
The manager's personal scout is for when Ole is extra interested in certain players, so Ole directs where he goes, and he reports to Ole for him to have extra talking points, but ultimately answers to the total scouting structure if we are to move on certain players.

That part isn't true. At least on the continent and in all sports there is a hierarchy and the DOF is above the head coach(managers aren't really a thing around here); the DOF hires the head coach and controls his fate with the CEO.

 

[Amir]

Other clubs the CEO/ DoF does the negotiations. That's not the case at Man Utd. So your point falls flat.

We don't actually know how other clubs operate exactly.

I really don't see how 'other clubs don't know who to call' is an explanation for a new title.

 

[VP89]

I think it's going to come down to whether the newly hired personnel get the autonomy they need to do well. If they do, then we can trust the process so long as its the right man for the right job. Good things are said about both and for all the slack Woodward has received, he likely wants the best for the club and looks to have finally delegated footballing matters. So the only take here is a positive one, until we see how it unravels at least.

 

[Bristol_Red_87]

He sounds like a 90's action movie hero cop. I'd watch a franchise based on Murtough's revenge.

Howling Mad Murtough?