Peter Moore: How Liverpool 'merge analogue and digital'
Moore says Liverpool employ "subject-matter experts"
Written by Simon Austin — September 25, 2019
LIVERPOOL chief executive Peter Moore says the club has “merged digital and analogue” to create “the essence of a modern football club”.
The 64-year-old, speaking at the World Football Summit in Madrid, highlighted how the European champions have combined data and analysis with traditional scouting and human judgement to create success.
Liverpool’s four-man data science unit, headed by Dr Ian Graham, is widely regarded as the best in English football
“There is a merging of data and the experienced eye - the analogue and digital coming together,” Moore told former Liverpool player Michael Robinson, who is now a leading broadcaster, during the interview at the Summit.
“We use applied science and technology to analyse players to create the best chance to win. From an analogue way, we look at the player and assess what they are about, both on and off the pitch. And we apply science.
“We have four PhDs who are part of our club (Graham’s ‘research’ team) and we have a director of sports science, who is also a PhD (presumably Conall Murtagh, who has a PhD from Liverpool John Moores University) and they look at data.
“It is that combination, that amalgamation of an experienced eye - of looking at an athlete - combined with data, with psychological outputs, to see the person as a good player for Liverpool and also a good human being in the locker room.
“Being a good person that happens to be a good football player is what you need to be for Liverpool Football Club. When I look at our squad, knowing most of the players, they fit that bill.”
Moore, who has been the club’s CEO since June 2017, said the club have a structure where they have “subject-matter experts in their fields”.
“We have a Sporting Director (Michael Edwards), who is akin to a General Manager in American sports,” Moore said. “I don’t have anything to do with that.
“I run the business of Liverpool Football Club. The speciality experience of our Sporting Director - he and his scouting staff and analytical staff are the ones that build the squad. Jurgen Klopp, as the manager, gets the best out of that squad.
Peter Moore on the importance of data to drive decision-making, the principle for buying players and how the club is structured #WFS19 pic.twitter.com/iZZPa5aIs6
— Enzo Angilletta (@nearwen) September 25, 2019
“Together, we come together as an entity, with Billy Hogan, our chief commercial officer, and we are fundamentally what I believe is the essence of what a modern football club needs to be.
“It’s that combination in modern football now. It needs to be organised, to have a culture, to build on success, where you have subject-matter experts in their fields who all come together as one.”
And Moore, speaking in the city where Liverpool won the European Cup in May, paid tribute to Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp.
"Jurgen is one of the more holistic human beings you will ever meet,” he said.
“That was the fifth cup final he had lost (the Champions League final in 2018). He will sit down at times and say, ‘it’s only football’.
“He has this mentality, ‘don’t love us when we win if you’ll hate us when we lose’, so he has that broader picture. He is able to keep the ship going straight, motivate not just the players but his staff, the coaching staff, the sports science staff - he keeps everyone on an even keel.
"His personality is infectious. His charisma is without question. Even when you have lost he makes you think there is a brighter sunshine ahead."
You can watch the full interview HERE.
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