The Nowhere Men (25 page)

‘You never really know what is going on at other clubs. You don’t know about the constraints so it is difficult to make judgements. For instance, the club might have a wonderful academy, but never produce a player because of internal politics. I am chief scout, but every club has specific duties regardless of the similarity of the title. We all get our coats on, and get out there and watch games, but I have more of a sporting director type of role, in that my key alliance is with the CEO, Alistair Mackintosh.’

The inclusive culture fostered by Mackintosh, who arrived from Manchester City in the summer of 2008, suited someone of Simmonds’ diverse background and innovative nature. In addition to scouting, he had managed in New Zealand, coached in non-league football and operated as managing director of Darlington before he joined Fulham.

His philosophy was summarised by a favourite phrase: ‘The brightest gold is found in the murkiest rivers.’ To prove the point, he had recruited Canadian striker Alen Marcina from Puerto Rico and Gao Leilei from China while in charge of New Zealand Knights, in the Australian A League.

Simmonds was inventive, tireless. He hosted a biannual scouting conference at Craven Cottage, and insisted each scout watch the Fulham first team, so they could benchmark regulars against potential signings. They took turns to liaise with directors, who were designated as a ‘scout host’ for each home game. He compiled a weekly scouting summary, in a magazine format, for senior management and board members, with detailed assessments and updates of principal targets.

‘What the chief executive has done is promote and support the ethos that just because you are not based at the training ground it doesn’t mean you’re not part of the club. We can’t afford to think of our scouts as Occasional Al. We promote the idea that they should talk to one another. A lot of people ask me “are you fucking mad?” and tell me that encourages them to talk about me behind my back. That just shows you the level of insecurity in the game.

‘You have got to be more concerned about getting it right than getting it wrong. You can’t afford to worry about the labels put on players when you pay a lot of money for them. Money has always been integral to the process. In 1925, Arsenal advertised in the
Athletic News
for a new manager. It stressed that the successful applicant would be expected to build a team, and not pay exorbitant fees. What was one of the first things Herbert Chapman did when they appointed him? Break the transfer record by paying Bolton ten grand for David Jack.’

Simmonds introduced the notion of ‘stealth scouting’, playing matches, featuring targeted players, on a video loop on a centrally situated screen in the office he shared with the coaching staff. The desks were close together, and signs of haste, half-empty coffee cups and scrawled session plans, were conspicuous amongst the common room clutter. His response to the inevitable teasing from the coaches about his belief in subliminal messaging – ‘your work keeps me in work’ – was predictable, shameless and entirely acceptable.

Satellite feeds ensured he had access to every French League game by Sunday evening: ‘Everton were one of the first clubs to latch on to the possibilities. They had those big old satellite dishes at the training ground. It looked like Jodrell Bank. When I arrived at Fulham the only database we had was hand-written reports, in position order, in a filing cabinet.’

He insisted his scouts stay in hotels after night games: ‘I’m not having one of mine driving his Mondeo up and down the motorways, past midnight, with only a Ginsters pie for company. I want them to feel valued. If they are family men, I try to ensure they are at home for the big holidays, like Christmas and Easter. If anyone needs to be on the way to Gatwick at five a.m., it’s me.’

Tales from the trenches kept everyone entertained. Simmonds ‘cried for four days’ after being tear-gassed by riot police at a Paris St Germain match. A favourite fixture was the Athens derby between Olympiakos and Panathinaikos: ‘Some bright spark in the marketing department decided to put a DVD of highlights of twenty years’ worth of derby games on every seat. Fine, until some poor soul had to take a corner. He was pelted with about twenty thousand DVDs. Mad, absolutely mad.’

On this particular afternoon, when the muffled dramas of a development match against Aston Villa filtered through to the coffee station of a modern dining room, he was in the midst of another road trip. He had just spent three days in Turkey, where he took in four games, and assessed players with development potential. He was due to leave for a European scouts meeting in Holland, which he intended to use as a base for a swing through France, Belgium, the Czech Republic and Germany.

‘We have this concept of legacy scouting, where we look for players with medium- to long-term value for the club, irrespective of who the manager or head coach is. Mousa Dembele is a good example of a legacy player. We purchased him, even though Roy Hodgson didn’t fancy him when he was manager here.

‘I have tremendous respect for Roy as a man, and as a football man. The way he was treated when he became England manager was disgusting. I have learned so much from him, but when he goes into one it is best to let him go. He has got a temper on him. Managers are ridiculously stretched, but I’d managed to get him to spend a rare night off in Holland, watching Mousa play for AZ Alkmaar against Roda JC. They used him as a winger.

‘Roy was soon on the phone, and what he didn’t call me wasn’t worth knowing. He basically accused me of wasting his time. When his anger had blown itself out, I explained I saw Mousa playing through the middle, not as a wide man. Roy had obviously had enough. “No chance,” he said. It was only later, when he was managing Liverpool, that he called, and said, “you were right weren’t you?”

Hodgson was, with Bobby Moore, Malcolm Allison, Harry Redknapp and John Cartwright, one of the men Simmonds regarded as ‘life mentors’. He had put him through his preliminary coaching badge when he was 16, though he was meant to be 18, and was a source of consistent advice, as well as occasional admonition. His failure to make the grade as a player at Crystal Palace was a blessing in disguise:

‘I was always interested in coaching. Malcolm Allison and John Cartwright at Palace used to let me be a nuisance. They saw I was hungry for the game. I was very fortunate to meet Bobby Moore, through Harry Redknapp, so early. I was on an FA course with him and he ended up taking me to Oxford City. He recommended me as youth team coach at Fulham. I was twenty-three, and also did the reserves, but in hindsight it was too much too soon.

‘I always wanted to coach and travel. My first manager’s job was in Nelson, on the South Island of New Zealand. It was part time, but we trained each day from four p.m. to six p.m. I asked the club to improve the lights, because it was so dingy, but there was no money. One of the directors, a sheep farmer, came up with an alternative solution. He painted the goalposts in luminous paint, and also dipped the balls in it, in the way he dipped sheep.

‘It was a strange one, but I got on with it. I’m in the centre circle with my assistant, checking through the session we had planned, when I notice the first two players coming out of the changing room. One gets the ball, the other wheels away. He wants it on his head. Anyway, the guy kicks it, and collapses, screaming. The other guy heads it, and is knocked out. The paint had dried and it was like a cannonball.’

Like many in his trade, he had cause to be grateful for a twist of fate, and the paternal benevolence of John Griffin who, in his dotage, was operating as Wycombe Wanderers’ chief scout. Simmonds was coaching at Dulwich Hamlet in 1999 when Brentford were owned by Ron Noades, and shared training facilities with Crystal Palace. Paul Kember, son of Crystal Palace’s chief scout Steve, was playing for him, so they gravitated naturally towards clubs which had an intimate, almost incestuous relationship.

‘I used to watch training as often as I could. John Griff would always be there, ready for a cup of tea and a chat. On this particular day, he mentioned that Stan Ternant had just left Palace. On the off chance they’d need a coach, I told Steve Coppell that I’d love to come back to the club. He said they needed some help on the scouting side, but I said “fuck that”. Steve was persistent, though. He persuaded me to try it, and it grew from there.

‘I spent more and more time with John in his tiny office, going through the box files behind his desk. He was so open with me, so generous with his time. Secretly, I was thinking: put up with this for three months and you’ll be running the reserves, but we went through players together. Gradually I became intrigued. I began to ask John more and more questions: “What do you look for? How do you compare players? What am I doing wrong?”

‘I was making classic mistakes. At half-time I would allow myself to be sidetracked. I’d be trying to imagine what the coaches were saying to the players in the dressing room or what I would be saying to them, instead of concentrating on my man or men. I realised I needed a completely different mindset.

‘Now, if you speak to me ten minutes after a game, I can’t tell you the specifics of what happened. I will only know that later, when I watch the DVD. I just don’t follow the ball. Let’s say I am watching a centre half. Providing he is on his game, I will know or sense, where the ball is by studying his body shape. Even though I have a team sheet, names and numbers are incidental to me.’

Simmonds was solicitous towards Griffin, before, during and after Fulham’s development match against Villa. The old scout sat between his nephews, Gary Johnson, the Yeovil manager, and his brother Steve, who had claimed the scout’s job at AFC Wimbledon. Simmonds had helped Griffin out the previous winter, by loaning Italian striker Marcello Trotta to Wycombe, where he scored eight goals in eight games.

Trotta, a product of the Napoli youth system, had not distinguished himself that afternoon, despite a smartly taken goal; there was a collective intake of breath from the 20 or so scouts, assembled in a small stand at the training ground, when he pulled out of a challenge with the goalkeeper. Such blatant self-preservation pandered to the stereotype. The B word – ‘bottler’ – was murmured, like an ugly secret.

The new season, in League Two, had not started well. The club was under the control of a Supporters Trust, whose responsibilities dispelled the romantic notion of a fans’ buy-out. Steve Hayes, Wycombe’s former owner, was on extended bail until May 2013, following his arrest by the Metropolitan Police as part of Operation Tuleta. In February 2013 Hayes stated that he was still co-operating with police in a protracted investigation – although he stressed he had not been charged with any offence and was confident he would not be.

Griffin was cordial, yet grim, and could not conceal his concern for his manager, Gary Waddock: ‘It’s an absolute nightmare. I promise you I am not exaggerating, but we have an entire first team on the injury list. We’ve had to play eight teenagers, and we are only five games in. We’ve had broken legs, cruciates, the lot. It’s even happening in training. I could hear someone screaming when I drove into the training ground yesterday. It was our left back. He’d done his cruciate, turning quickly.

‘We get the call at six p.m. Out for the season, quite unbelievable. I’ve never been at a club like it, in forty years in the game. It is in danger of falling apart. We’re begging for loan players, pleading to pay them a hundred, two hundred quid a week. They’re just players, not that good, but they are all we have got. The club is being run by the Supporters’ Trust. They’re fans, and behaving like them. There’s been a lot of chatter about Wadds.

‘Trust me, this manager is good. I’ve worked with Terry Venables, the best, and this guy is fantastic, an absolute diamond. The vultures are gathering. Managers looking for work are suddenly turning up to watch. I see them in the stand. I don’t blame them. That’s what managers do. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but we play AFC Wimbledon on Saturday. If we don’t win that Wadds’ days are numbered.’

The sadness of the veteran scout was telling; his prescience was equally poignant. Wycombe marked their 125th anniversary celebrations by losing 1–0 at home to Wimbledon on September 22. They were booed off at half- and full-time. Reserve goalkeeper Elliott Parish saved a penalty, but sustained a cartilage injury. Waddock was so upset he needed 45 minutes to compose himself before attending a press conference. He began by apologising, but his farewell speech was soured by empty defiance and bitter recrimination. ‘The players have let the club down, let themselves down, and let me down,’ he said, before going off to meet his fate. He was sacked that evening.

‘All the people in the game are telling him he’ll get another job,’ reported Griffin, who took things too personally for his own good. ‘They know what a terrific manager he is, but chairmen will only look at us getting relegated, and struggling this season. I don’t know whether I’ve still got a job but that doesn’t seem particularly important at the moment, to be honest.’

Employment news was bad, and didn’t get any better. The obliteration of Watford’s scouting staff, following the club’s absorption into the empire of the Pozzo family, owners of Udinese in Serie A and Granada in La Liga, caused a surge of resentment. Headlines condemning Watford as ‘a snapshot of all that is wrong with the modern game’ found a receptive audience.

The ironies of the situation were galling. Gino Pozzo, the son of Giampaolo, who bought the Championship club for £15 million, paid homage to the art of scouting while culling an 11-man team headed by Brian Greenhalgh. ‘There is no cosmic mix to enable us to win, but we understand what works,’ claimed the Italian interloper. ‘Fifty per cent is good scouting, fifty per cent is good management.’

No one could deny the effectiveness of his business model, dependent upon a core group of 50 scouts, trawling under-utilised markets for young players at a critical phase of their development. The poster boy for the Udinese project is Alexis Sanchez. Spotted as a teenager in Chile, playing for Cobreloa in the Atacama Desert mining city of Calama, he was nurtured in Argentina and Italy before being sold to Barcelona in a deal worth €37 million.