Day 5: Scouting Players in Brazil

Scouting Players in Brazil
Today we had a guest talk from Alessandro Brita, who is in charge of scouting for Clube Atletico Paranaense. Originally we wanted to visit their training facilities, just as we did with Coritiba yesterday. However, Atletico are hosting the Spain team and basically their training facility has been closed down to prepare for that. So this was a pretty good plan B.

Atletico's probably has the most innovative and comprehensive scouting program in Brazil. They have network across the country and internationally (including in Angola - where the official language is Portuguese). They scout players from aged about 11 upwards. They don't bother with players any younger than that, which may come as a surprise. Basically they look for 11 year olds with good technical skills and take it from there. They also play a LOT of futsal, because they believe that is how some of the best players in the world learned their basic skills.

Their goal is to sign players age 14 on contracts that take them to the age of 20. They hope to get these players into the first team and sell them off for a profit by the time they reach their mid-20s. At the same time, they want their first team to be successful. This means they focus on young players. For example, in the last Atletico game, 8 players were 'home grown' and the average age was just 21.

Once the players come to the club (at age 14 or so) they are in a residential-type program. They have school in the mornings, train in the afternoons, and a 'social program' in the evenings which can include activities as diverse as going to the theatre, learning to cook, or 'study halls.' I was particularly interested by the fact that the players also receive English lessons twice a week. This is to make them more 'marketable' to the European market.

And Finally...
Your trusty correspondent is falling apart physically. My left knee is sore from a race last week, my right ankle has ballooned for some unknown reason (possibly from the treacherous sidewalks), I have a cold, and a sore throat. I went to the pharmacy yesterday and explaining my various ailments through the medium of mime was not particularly effective. The pharmacist did not react very positively when I mimed 'coughing' (try it and you'll see it kind of looks like something else). On the other hand, I went to a different pharmacy today and managed to get an ice pack using a combination of pointing with a 'french-spanish combo' language I have been developing.