should norwich search unknown lands to unearth new talent..??

[singing canary 0]

im fairly sure im not the first to think this , yet one thing that strikes me as i looked at our team is most of our team are british players .

we all are fully aware we do not have much money, yet as we all know some loan players have proven to be a risk .

when you look at the championship at the start of the season , its not like the premiership where you can guess pretty much where certain teams will finish within reason .

the amount of money in the premiership clubs is massive compaired to the championship ,

cutting to the chase , why not spend more time abroad scouting , surely not so well off countries such as poland , parts of africa, even south america have young raw talent that would jump at the chance of earning 20k a week .

this surely is a cheaper option than the silly money we have paid to agents for some of the high risk injury prone players norwich have signed.

i dont think it would cost the earth to pay good scouts and gain contacts all over the world , 5 or 6 quality players would bear fruit im sure.

im not sure what our scouting policy is , yet a high percentage of players we have are from teams in the premiership that are not quite good enough for the premiership.

all im saying is the world is a big place , half of arsenals success is bringing in unknown ,later to be superstars .

that 500k spent on agents fees last year could have been put to better use or could it?

[Beauseant 0]

Interesting post. While I agree in principle, I think that there are two obvious problems :

1. The big clubs also know that there is a lot of mileage in this.Their scouting networks and contacts are much wider and more sophisticated than anything we could set up. Having said that, they''re never going to sweep up every scrap of talent.

2. There are lots of examples of players from such countries being busts or even outright cons ( George Weah''s "nephew" at Southampton being an obvious example). We would need to ensure that our information gathering was very reliable as word of mouth or the opinion of a "reliable source" isn''t always very reliable (see Koroma OJ and Archibald-Henville T for examples!).

[a1canary 0]

I think there is much mileage in this but perhaps there should be a greater focus on our own doorstep - the UK and Ireland i mean. We''re all excited about Cody and hopeful that he could be the next Dave Kitson or Matt Derbyshire. They''re not world beaters but if there are more players like that to be found in the lower leagues then the likes of us should be working hard to unearth them. And they create a real feel good feeling and a buzz among the fans with their stories of part-time struggles and plumbing and scaffolding to make ends meet, to playing as a professional in front of 25,000. It connects fans and player in a way that no high wage premier league loan player could ever do.

So yes, more of this please! I read once that we were looking at Matt Mitchell-King at my local club Histon. Obviously nothing came of it but interesting that we were looking nevertheless.

[rjwc22 0]

The other advantage of the foreign players is if we are going to pursue the loanee path they do not count towards the allocation of 5 in the squad.

Having said that if we go too far afield we might have to start dealing with the Kia Joorabchians of this world and then our agents fees would really go up.

Why not spend some time in Ireland - Mooney seems to be good enough.

[BBFF 0]

Unknown Lands? do you mean Colney?

 

FOOTBALL MUST COME FIRST

[Xavi- Poor Mans Ian Crook 0]

Was that not how David Strihavka came here. What a success that was.

[singing canary 0]

i dont think every player outside the uk is going to be like strihavka.

some of the uk players we have had here has , dare i say it been worse than him .

my point is isnt it worth haver a wider look when looking for new players , considering the price of decent premiership players , where all the money is .

[rjwc22 0]

A wilson palacios or Nuno Valencia would be nice to find, and would help the books.

[Jonny 5 0]

The problem with looking for players outside of the UK and EU are the very strict work permit regulations. Having to play 75% of games for one of the higher ranked countries in the world.

Also an international scouting network would cost a significant amount of money and there is also the reoccurring problems that foreign players can have adapting to the English game.

Many of the foreign players that come over to the English leagues are extremely well know in footballing circles, Manucho was being touted as the next big thing for at least 5 years, as was Valencia and Palacios, it is a matter of a team taking a gamble on them. Also Valencia was pretty horrendous at the beginning of his time in the Premier League but Wigan were prepared to stick by him. But neither came particularly cheap in the first place.

[AJ 1,359]

Excellent, a new loan market - international loans! Lets delve into the loopholes...

[singing canary 0]

what we spend on a loan signing here , fees to a premiership club , surely in a poorer country we could buy that player for same .

if norwich are shelling out 500k just to the agents , i dred to think what we are paying in fees to the club involved ,also considering we still are paying wages for players now that are not even with us now .

even if its 10k a week,4 months =160k im sure that alone would buy a player , im sorry if im wrong im not sure what norwich players get im taking 10k as a rough guess.

[The Chirp 0]

442 mag has a great article on boca juniors... really got me thinking... it might be online... either way have a read. the way the bring through their youth is incredible. excellent youth policy.

[singing canary 0]

that was my thought , i know its not the same , but on football manager 2008 i searched all over the world i lost one game in the championship all season with 6 romanian internationals , which cost a total of 3 million quid .

and a couple of players from as you rightly said from boca juniors , and made a fortune later in the game .

they say they have based the game as closely as they can to the real stats of the players .!!!

i do think teams like us should look further afield than we do.

[missing in action? 0]

of course we shouldscouting is the best way of getting players on board.where and who you scout is a different matter.