The Nowhere Men (4 page)

‘There are not many players in the world that can get you into the Champions League, or can excel in the Premier League for a club of Liverpool’s heritage and ambition. We can pretty much afford anyone we want, but how many of those players are available? You can write off those at United, City, Barcelona, Real Madrid. You will have difficulties getting them out of Chelsea or Arsenal. What’s left, on the open market? That’s why we must have a massive database. The management of the knowledge is a challenge in itself. Michael has helped us tremendously in organising it. He has prevented us drowning in the data.

‘With senior players you assess the tactical, technical, physical and mental aspects of performance. Once you look at those four does he fit into your team philosophy? Is that what your manager wants? In a way you do not know what you are getting when you sign someone, but there are times when you are able to spend quality time with the player. You assess his background, his family and his agent. I often say, tell me who your agent is and I’ll tell you who you are. We are nowhere near to being psychologists, but when you have been doing this job for quite a while you manage to read the player’s personality. What you don’t know is whether he will thrive under pressure, or whether he will collapse under the weight of a big club. The best way to solve that riddle, to make an educated guess about what the player can become, is by doing what they do with the draft in the US, where they psychologically test players. That will never happen here because you are dealing with someone else’s property.’

And someone’s son. Everyone involved affected to ignore the moral ambivalence of the manic search for the best young talent. Competition was fierce, and minimal advantage, in an incestuous environment, was maximised. MK Dons manager Karl Robinson, who spent eight years as a Liverpool Academy coach, played a pivotal role in persuading Sheyi Ojo to sign for his old club instead of Chelsea, who assumed their £1.5 million bid for the schoolboy was sufficient. It cost Liverpool half that sum to lure Jerome Sinclair, another 14-year-old striker, from West Bromwich Albion’s Academy.

Mel Johnson used his friendship with Wycombe Wanderers manager Gary Waddock, with whom he had worked at QPR, to secure another prodigy, Jordon Ibe. He was tipped off the night before the 15-year-old made his first team debut against Sheffield Wednesday, and made a late switch to see the boy get booked for celebrating his goal with his parents, in the main stand. Johnson had a head start on suitors from Tottenham and Manchester United, and immediately recommended him to Comolli. He watched each of his 11 games with increasing trepidation before Liverpool made a £500,000 down payment on Ibe’s potential.

Yet one name at Melwood was spoken in hushed tones, as if reverence would spare its owner the random cruelties of fate: Raheem Sterling. Liverpool is a club, and a city, in thrall to the compelling possibilities of an underdog’s story, and I had not known such anticipation for more than two decades. Then, at a social function whose purpose has long since been lost in time, I had sat next to Ian St John, and listened, rapt, to tales of a 12-year-old known simply as ‘Michael’.

Michael Owen’s was a straightforward story. He was the son of a former footballer, who represented the values of a tightly knit family with middle-class pretensions. Sterling’s was more edgy, that of a ghetto child who owed everything to the wisdom and love of a mother, Nadine, who brought four children up on her own in the most difficult circumstances. Owen coped with his commoditisation, but no one knew if Sterling had the maturity to deal with the apparent inevitability of celebrity.

His journey began in Maverley, one of Jamaica’s most marginalised communities, where gun crime is rife, and drug gangs dispense summary justice. He played street scrimmage, an anarchic form of football with fluid rules, on the ominously named Reaper Road, before, at the age of six, he emigrated, with his family. He was transplanted into a similar culture on the St Raphael’s estate, in the shadow of Wembley Stadium.

The St Raphz Soldiers, a so-called Blood gang aligned to the Mozart Crew, fought the Suspect Gang from the adjoining Stonebridge estate. Violence escalated, with police reporting that Yardie drug barons had ordered hit-men, imported from Jamaica, to put a murderous end to factional fighting among crack-cocaine dealers in the area. Sterling failed to settle in a mainstream primary school, because of behavioural problems, but found salvation at the Vernon House Special School and in the Alpha and Omega youth team.

He gradually overcame anger management issues, and the stigma of being labelled by social services as having special educational needs was neutralised by his footballing ability. The game consumed him; it highlighted his work ethic and underpinned his fragile self-esteem. His mother successfully taught him the importance of personal and mutual respect. He joined Queens Park Rangers’ Centre of Excellence at the age of 11, and within three years was starring for the Under 18s. His pace and directness were matched by a surreal, almost balletic, quality on the ball. Crowds swelled from 50 to 500.

Mark Anderson, Liverpool’s youth scout, was alerted to the phenomenon by his brother Lee. He first saw Sterling play against Crystal Palace. ‘I couldn’t believe my eyes,’ he said. ‘There were some raw edges, but he was the best thing I’d ever seen. I flagged him up immediately, and watched him countless times. He produced something special in every game, showed me everything.’ Frank McParland, Liverpool’s Academy Director, responded identically, and the chase was on.

Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City were also interested, yet there was a strange innocence about Sterling. He omitted to tell QPR he had been taken informally under the wing of Tom Walley, a veteran youth coach who produced such England internationals as Ashley Cole and David James. Walley had no ulterior motive; he was in thrall to the purity of the boy’s talent. ‘I was looking for a bit of purple, a bit of quality,’ he remembered. ‘I found it.’ The tipping point came one afternoon in Cassiobury Park, Watford, where Sterling played one on one against his friend, my nephew, Jamie. They literally used jumpers for goalposts. The coach called my brother David, Jamie’s father, with a simple entreaty: “Get down here, quick. This is something special.”’

Sterling was a regular in pick-up games organised by Walley on a pitch marked out in the back garden of the home of Tim Sherwood, Tottenham’s technical co-ordinator. A trial game was arranged, between Tottenham Under 15s and a Brent Schools select, featuring Sterling, who was thought to be available for £200,000. Re-markably, Spurs turned him down, because academy coaches were split about his long-term potential and the challenges of his background. Fulham were convinced they were about to sign him. ‘We had Raheem in the building, and were totally blown away when Liverpool came in for the boy,’ admitted Barry Simmonds, their chief scout. Anderson and McParland had successfully lobbied Sterling’s family, and close friends, that Raheem’s best interests would be served by a £1 million move to Merseyside. A month before his 15th birthday, he was billeted with ‘house parents’ and installed in the fifth form at Rainhill School in St Helens.

Comolli, who admitted his reluctance to recruit players with definable social problems, exhibited an intriguing sense of detachment: ‘We are happy to take risks on young talent. Time will tell whether young players tick all the boxes. We don’t use statistics with them, because we haven’t got any data. So we purely rely on the scout’s eyes. It was the same with Gareth Bale when he came to Tottenham. We were relying on Mel’s eyes, my eyes. Obviously I am involved to a degree, but when it comes to big signings, high profile young players, I don’t go to see them. When they walk into the place most of the time I don’t know them, but I trust the people I work with. Mel and Frank would have seen them. So would five or six other scouts.

‘When we are really keen and think we are going to do it, I challenge people a little bit: “How does he compare to so and so? What’s the deal? Is it expensive? Have you checked his background?” Then Frank comes to me, and says this is the deal. I then say yes or no. When you talk about young players we think we have a playing philosophy here which can be summarised very simply. We have a pass and move style. We want to have possession of the ball. We want talented players who are going to fit that system, who are going to make the difference individually in the final third. So if you talk about Raheem, or Jordon for that matter, that is exactly what they are.’

His aloofness defied the emotional intensity of the game, and of the club which was going through an intermittent bout of self-analysis. Did he never experience that eureka moment of recognition, or that post-coital glow of sheer satisfaction? At last, a smile: ‘Once, with Cristiano Ronaldo. I was with Arsenal. I was the only scout at the Montaigu tournament in France. It is the best under sixteen tournament in Europe. Portugal were playing Japan on a Thursday afternoon. At half time I called my contact in Portugal and said, “I have just seen something unbelievable, I need to know everything about him.” It was incredible . . .’

He was wistful, almost lovestruck in tone, but it was a fleeting indulgence. ‘Personal development is massive,’ he announced, in a more familiar, businesslike tone. ‘I am not the same person, not the same scout in practice, that I was fifteen years ago. It is an accumulation of experience that makes you intelligent, or more intelligent, I should say. There are things I look at now that I never used to look at. I had this understanding with Arsène. I knew exactly how he worked. I knew exactly how he thought. I knew exactly how he wanted to play, what type of player he wanted.

‘Take Robin Van Persie, as an example. When we signed him for Arsenal he had generally been used as a substitute. Steve Rowley, the chief scout, and myself used to go and see ten minutes, fifteen minutes twenty minutes. We were absolutely astonished by his talent. We pushed and we pushed and we pushed for Arsenal to sign him. For peanuts. And of course he had deficiencies. He had disciplinary issues. He had this and that, but I always thought if we give this player to Arsène, he’s gonna make him something special. What I hate in scouting is strict rules. Clubs tell me we do that and we do that and then we do that. I hate that, because there are no rules, absolutely no rules.

‘I watched Robert Pires fourteen times, and he convinced me on the fourteenth time. I watched him home and away. In the national team and for his club. When it was cold, when it was hot. On the right, on the left, central. Everything you can think of. The only doubt we had about him was his mental toughness. I went to see him the day before my first daughter was born. When I came back home I had to take my wife straight to hospital. I almost missed the birth of my first child. Robert was playing for Marseille at Sedan. If Marseille lost, they were going down to the Second Division. You can imagine the pressure – that would be like Man United going down. He was absolutely outstanding. He carried the team on his shoulders. He was fantastic. The next day from the hospital, waiting for my child to arrive, I called Arsène and told him: “I have two pieces of news. One we are in the hospital. My child is on the way. Two Pires – sign him.”’

His tone was measured, but it was, nevertheless, a stream of consciousness. The contradictions of Comolli’s character had emerged without warning, like a sudden storm at sea. His knowledge was unimpeachable, extensive, but he felt the need for self-justification. It was as if he, the über-professional, had been overcome by vanity. The mask was off.

‘I am not a man of rules,’ he insisted. ‘People talk of value. Value? You can find it everywhere. Did we find and create value by buying Luis Suarez for twenty-two million euros? Of course we did. He was an obvious one for everybody, but we took the plunge. We were the ones who decided to do something about it. Billy Beane is like all the people I have met in sports who are very successful. He has an incredible drive. Nothing can stop him. I am determined that our structure will not change.

‘We will still need the scout with the flat cap. I don’t agree with those who say all a football club needs is some kids with a laptop. They are missing the point. They went to see
Moneyball
at the cinema, or they read the book. The best users of statistics are the ones who have a highly qualified and competent scouting network and a highly qualified and competent analysis department. It is definitely a mix of the two. The best baseball teams use both. That’s what people don’t get.

‘The Yankees have got twenty-one statisticians but they also have a very competitive, competent scouting network. The Red Sox are employing Bill James, the guru. They have statisticians in-house. They are very, very bright people. But they have fifty scouts all over the world. I was amazed. They cover Asia, the West Indies and Australia. They have a scout in Europe who covers Holland. That breadth of coverage is very, very important. Using both aspects will help us optimise our investments and reduce the risk of making a mistake. I don’t believe in a single use of scouting, or a single use of data. It limits the options.’

The emotional squall was over. It was time to cross the city of Liverpool, and leave the club that Billy Shankly created, but Billy Beane was reshaping,
in absentia
. Shankly wove dreams, while Beane crunched numbers. Liverpool, under Comolli’s direction, were spending extravagantly, while the Oakland Athletics excelled because they became masters of financial control. As Comolli spoke, Dalglish was holding court in Melwood’s Media Centre. He proclaimed that it would ‘take one hell of a player’ to improve his squad.

Something had to give.

DAVID MOYES IS
not a man to cross on a moment’s whim. He has a finely developed sense of respect. His trust, once earned, is of immeasurable importance. His professionalism is unimpeachable. His eye for detail is acute. His work ethic is prodigious and his wrath is best avoided. Had he walked into Finch Farm training complex, that bleak, wet Wednesday morning, he would have been distinctly unimpressed.