The Slot Machine: SCOUT NOTES, April 29th

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Happy Monday - it’s not usual to have SCOUT NOTES drop this early in the week, but we wanted to treat ya. Also, we forgot to publish one last week.

If that’s the kind of professionalism you’re looking for in a writer-owned online magazine, have you considered a paid subscription to ours? This month we’re holding a subscription drive to fund the Summer of SCOUTED, our plan to bring you the next generation during these glorious summer months.

We’re about to dive into the football, don’t worry - but first I need to remind all those who enjoy reading SCOUT NOTES every week that we can’t keep the mag afloat without financial support. So if you’re willing and able, grab a subscription this summer, or tell your friends - it all helps.

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We’re planning a massive summer of youth football coverage you won’t find anywhere else. We can’t wait. And you can’t wait for me to shut up, so:

Sven Mistlintat? Sven Mislinback!

In case you missed it, Sven Mistlintat is back in at Borussia Dortmund.

He returns to the club where he first made his name to take charge of their recruitment and squad planning in a behind-the-scenes football operation that is shifting significantly going into this summer.

It could be brilliant or bonkers, or probably a wild mix of both. At his best, Mislintat finds exciting young prospects from all over the world at cheaper prices, picking out the best that have the quality to make an impact and potential to be sold for big profits (see: first stint at BVB, Stuttgart). At his worst, he packs the squad with a messy mix of promising-but-unproven prospects and strange managerial appointments (see: Ajax) and cuddles up to certain agents (see: Arsenal).

What Borussia Dortmud desperately need is a direction. Long gone are the days of them being the talent-gobbling, profit-making monsters in the market of exciting young talent. Their recent recruitment has seen them lean heavily on prime-age Bundesliga players and some expensive punts. Mislintat will certainly move away from that in his own idiosyncratic way.

Let’s wait and see what the summer holds in Dortmund. Chaos, probably.

Keep tabs on Matías Fernández-Pardo

Since the start of March, the 19-year-old forward has really caught the eye for KAA Gent in Belgian football. He’s helped filled the void left by Gift Emmanuel Orban, and he himself is making an Orban-lite impact.

Fernández-Pardo plays as a sort of auxillary forward in Gent’s fast and direct forward line, bouncing off a couple of others. His movement is sharp off the shoulder, he can create his own shots with quick shift-and-strikes, he has the burst to separate from defenders, and he’s an all-round talented technician.

Since making his first start of the Pro League season at the beginning of March, the Belgian U-19 international has scored four goals in nine games — a tally that could easily be two or three more — and made a name from himself coming from the relative obscurity of B team football.

We like him. There are some caveats about the forward-friendly system he plays in, but the basics of his skillset — the sharpness, the ball-striking, the directness — are promising. Expect to see a lot more of Fernández-Pardo.

Seventh tier to the top tier

Ardent SCOUT NOTES readers will be well aware of our love for non-league football and, in particular, the incredible English football pyramid. Well, this weekend saw another of its alumnus make their Premier League debut.

Dominic Sadi started out in the West Ham academy before leaving for Stoke City — that’s a pretty common move, swapping one Cat 1 academy for another, seeking a fresh start. What isn’t as common was his decision to drop down five tiers to the Isthmian Premier Division a year later as an 18-year-old, joining Barnet-based Wingate & Finchley.

All it took was a season there for Bournemouth to pick him up, where he’s been impressing for their U-21 team over the past couple of seasons leading up to a Premier League debut over the weekend.

Upon joining Bournemouth, Sadi said this about his spell in non-league:

“Playing men’s football has just toughened me up physically and mentally and made me ahead of my peers; it’s improved me a lot. In men’s football you learn, you get a lot of insight of how people of an older age carry themselves around both on and off the football pitch. It’s all just professionalism around them and as a young kid like myself, it’s good to see that early so I can progress from there.”

More should take a leaf from Sadi’s book. Instead of bouncing around mollycoddled academy teams, back yourself in senior football. Drop down the division to play proper football. Show your talents where it really matters. Do that and you can bounce straight back up, hitting even higher heights.

Gambling on the Slot machine

Arne Slot to Liverpool is fun — but it is a gamble, and a pretty big one.

As followers of youth football, Slot’s AZ Alkmaar and Feyenoord teams have been a prominent focus for us since 2019. Not only does he give opportunities to young players, he develops pretty much everyone he gets his hands on and his style of football is enjoyable to watch and proven to be successful.

But the leap in level is massive. Feyernoord are a big club, but the expectation of a superclub in the super league is practically impossible to comprehend.

That’s the gamble Liverpool are taking: can Slot stick that leap? The pressure is far greater, the budgets are infinitely bigger, the players are significantly better and the opposition is much sterner. He’s managed one step up before, but this is another

What the prospective appointment of Slot will (probably, hopefully) do is protect the connection between academy and senior teams that Klopp has nurtured better than any other elite-level manager in recent history. Kids like Trent, Bradley, Bajčetić and Danns will continue to get the opportunities they deserve — as long as the big decisions by Michael Edwards allow for it.

Football Manager Corner

Anyone that followed our comprehensive UEFA Youth League coverage this season will know how much we love Bayern München’s Javier Fernández.

So much so, he was one of the first names we looked for after FM24’s big update — and what we found definitely doesn’t disappoint…

His do-it-all ability as a midfielder is reflected really well as a 16-year-old at the start of your (new) FM24 saves. Despite his young age, he’s physical and technical in equal measure with a broad base of attributes that can scale up really well over time.

It will cost a relatively big fee to get him out of Bayern straight away but, if he develops as he should, the investment will look like a very shrewd one in three or four years time. He’s good enough to handle senior minutes at certain levels already.

SCOUTED’s Reading List

• Olympiacos made history this week by winning the UEFA Youth League. We’ve covered the tournament in detail - to our knowledge, we’re the only publication around to do so. Llew’s report on the final stretch is a great read.

• We’re a bit late, but Grace Robertson’s early-April piece on positional play is a nice summation of football’s most recent tactical ‘era’ - are we headed towards something new?

• Huge news for Spurs fans is breaking as I write this - looks like Daniel Levy is ready to back Ange Postecoglou with a £500m warchest this summer. Wow.