January 2022

Norwich promotion for Mariela Nisotaki, the scouting pioneer

IN all her time travelling around Europe to watch games, Mariela Nisotaki has come across only two other full-time female scouts.

One is Helena Costa, who is now the Head of International Scouting for Eintracht Frankfurt; the other Andrea Orts, who has worked for Espanyol for the last four years.

In England there are none other than Nisotaki, which makes her a true pioneer. The 31-year-old has worked for Norwich City for almost five years, in range of recruitment roles including Lead Recruitment Analyst, European and Domestic Lead Scout and now Head of Emerging Talent.

This is a newly-created position that involves identifying and monitoring the best talent in the 17 to 21-year-old age range, in the UK, Europe and beyond. Nisotaki, who is originally from Greece, will work closely with Sporting Director Stuart Webber and new Head of Recruitment Lee Dunn in the job.

Technical Scout Mike Haines, who joined last month from Manchester United, and Recruitment Analyst Peter Skeels, who has been with the Canaries since September 2018, are two other important members of an expanding recruitment and analysis department at the club.

Nisotaki has chosen to view her novel position as the only woman in the male-dominated world of football scouting as a positive, rather than a negative.

In an interview with the Eastern Daily Press last year she said: “One thing I always say is that your difference is probably your strength, whether it’s women in football or something else.

“So for me it’s an advantage. If you are working hard enough and you are confident in yourself, it’s an advantage because people remember me. If I go to a stadium they remember, ‘this is Mariela from Norwich’, so that’s good.

“It’s challenging but that’s good. It’s challenging for everyone when you are working in professional football – for women and men.”

Nisotaki was a sports mad youngster who was particularly fond of the Football Manager computer game.

“I remember my father saying, ‘Why do you know all these players? Is that any use to you?’ she remembered in an interview with Greece’s Sport 24 in 2016.

Having worked as a football coach in her homeland, she completed a Masters in Performance Analysis at Cardiff Metropolitan University in 2016, but before even graduating had landed a job in the analysis department at Swansea City. There were 160 applicants for two first-team performance analysis jobs and Nisotaki managed to make it through.

The department developed quickly under manager Garry Monk and in the 2016 interview Nisotaki said: “Five years ago, there was no analyst. Now, there is a team of six.”

A short spell as Lead Performance Analyst at Atromitos in Athens followed before Nisotaki got the job of first-team technical analyst at Norwich in January 2017.

During five years at Carrow Road she has risen up the ranks and is a highly-valued member of staff, as well as being a true pioneer for women in recruitment.

Article first published on Training Ground Guru written by Simon Austin

MIDDLESBROUGH Head of Football Kieran Scott says his job is to “control what the future looks like”.

The 38-year-old joined Boro in August last year from Norwich City, where he was their Head of Recruitment. His title at the Riverside is the unusual one of Head of Football, although the role is actually akin to that of the more common Sporting Director or Director of Football.

“For me, the key area for a Director of Football is the ins and outs of player transfers,” Scott told The Northern Echo. “You’ve got to look at the squad and be able to control what the future looks like.

“You’ve got players coming in from the Academy and you’ve got to make sure the path stays clear for them, and then you’ve also got your sales and purchases. You’re trying to put square pegs in square holes all the time, whether that’s an internal player or an external player that you’re recruiting.”

He explained where he comes in in the recruitment process.

“In terms of signing a player, my role really comes in right at the end, and that’s the deal,” he said. “Of course, I need to see the players and agree they’re right for the club and that the manager is on board, but the shortlisting and scouting, and the early part of the work, is done by the recruitment team underneath.

“We’ve started the process of appointing a new Head of Recruitment (a position that has been vacant since 2019), and they’ll come to me for what will effectively be the end of the process, where we can then work together and make the deals happen.”

Scott’s first big job at Boro was to help appoint a new manager after Neil Warnock was sacked in November. Former Sheffield United boss Chris Wilder came in after a “thorough process”.

“It wasn’t necessarily a case of the previous manager leaving straight away, but it was clearly going to happen at some stage,” Scott said. I’d witnessed what was going on, on the pitch and on the training ground, and by the end I think there was just an acceptance that it needed new blood and new energy. It needed some new life, and for me, that meant a new manager.

“It was my job to identify candidates and analyse whether they’d be a good fit for Middlesbrough. It was clear Chris fitted the bill as to what we needed. We went through a thorough process – it wasn’t like a one-man shortlist – but as soon as I met Chris, I knew he was a great fit for the club.

“I thought his style of play would really suit us and I knew the intensity of what he would bring would be a huge lift for everybody. Without doubt, Chris was the right man for the job.”

Another responsibility of the Director of Football is to retain some continuity in the backroom staff, rather than changing them every time the manager changes, Scott added.

“If Chris does fantastic and Manchester United want to take him, he’s going to take key staff with him, there’s nothing you can do about that,” he said.

“But there has to be a nucleus of staff behind that stay and help build a mentality within the club, so if there is a shift, we’re just replacing certain key staff within a structure that remains constant. That’s definitely an area where I’m still working hard to get the balance right.”

Article first published on Training Ground Guru written by Training Ground Guru