Why the Richest Clubs in Football CAN'T Compete With This — Transcript

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1. 0:00There is one rule in football that
2. 0:01everyone accepts because for a hundred
3. 0:03years it was simply true. The club that
4. 0:06spends the most wins. The richest team
5. 0:09buys the best players. The best players
6. 0:11win the games and everyone below learns
7. 0:13to live in that order. Three clubs
8. 0:15stopped accepting it. Brighton,
9. 0:16Brenford, and Bournemouth. No history,
10. 0:19no trophies. Three of the smallest
11. 0:21budgets in the Premier League. Every
12. 0:23summer, the biggest clubs on Earth
13. 0:25arrive and buy their best players for
14. 0:27enormous money. Chelsea, Manchester
15. 0:29United, Liverpool, Real Madrid, Paris
16. 0:31Sanain, all of them have come and paid
17. 0:33and left with someone. And every summer,
18. 0:36stripped of their best again, these
19. 0:37three clubs reload and keep landing
20. 0:39above clubs spending many times what
21. 0:41they do. It used to happen once in a
22. 0:43while, and everyone called it a good
23. 0:44season. Now, it happens too often to
24. 0:47many of the same clubs to keep calling
25. 0:48it luck. The pattern [music] is there,
26. 0:50and for the clubs at the top, that is
27. 0:52the part that should frighten them. So,
28. 0:54how does a club that cannot outspend
29. 0:56anyone keep beating the clubs that
30. 0:58outspend everyone? There is an answer,
31. 1:00and [music] it is not luck. It is a
32. 1:02method. One that has been copied,
33. 1:04proven, and taken all the way to the top
34. 1:06of [music] the game, and one the richest
35. 1:07clubs in the world still can't make
36. 1:09work. Welcome to Mega Football. Let's
37. 1:12get started.
38. 1:18Football's transfer market spent a
39. 1:19century pricing players on the wrong
40. 1:22things. A goal tally, a fashionable
41. 1:24league, a big name, a loud agent, a
42. 1:27highlight reel that traveled well. A
43. 1:29striker who scored 20 in the Premier
44. 1:31League cost a fortune. A defensive
45. 1:34midfielder who quietly won the ball back
46. 1:36200 times a season in a league nobody
47. 1:38televised cost almost nothing [music]
48. 1:40because the things he did well never
49. 1:42showed up in the numbers anyone bothered
50. 1:44to look at. The market moved hundreds of
51. 1:46millions every year, and it was priced
52. 1:48on [music] instinct, which meant it was
53. 1:50full of players worth far more than
54. 1:52their price tag, sitting in plain sight,
55. 1:54waiting for someone who knew how to
56. 1:56measure them. Two men knew how to
57. 1:57measure them, and neither came from
58. 1:59football. Matthew Bennham built a
59. 2:01company called Smart Odds. Tony Bloom
60. 2:03built one called Star Lizard. Both were
61. 2:05professional gamblers, syndicates that
62. 2:07made their fortunes beating book makers
63. 2:08by building statistical models that
64. 2:10found the bets the market had priced
65. 2:12[music] wrong. So they bought football
66. 2:14clubs and ran them the same way they ran
67. 2:16the betting. [music] It worked before
68. 2:17either of them reached the Premier
69. 2:19League. In 2015, Benham's Danish [music]
70. 2:21club FC Micheland won the first
71. 2:24championship in its history. Built on
72. 2:25expected goals and a near obsessive
73. 2:27focus on set pieces [music] while the
74. 2:29rest of the league still signed players
75. 2:31on gut feeling. Benham had already taken
76. 2:33control of Brenford, [music] a League
77. 2:35One club in 2012. Bloom had taken over a
78. 2:38Brighton side that [music] had spent
79. 2:39years on the brink of financial
80. 2:41collapse. Within a decade, both were in
81. 2:43the Premier League. Both were selling
82. 2:45players to the richest clubs on Earth.
83. 2:47And both were finishing above teams,
84. 2:49spending many times what they did. The
85. 2:51method traveled everywhere they took it.
86. 2:53The only question left was how far it
87. 2:55could go. How far it could go is written
88. 2:58in the receipts. The operation is the
89. 3:00same at all three clubs, [music] and it
90. 3:02barely changes from one season to the
91. 3:04next. Buy a player the market has
92. 3:06underpriced. Develop him until a bigger
93. 3:08club decides it cannot live without him.
94. 3:10sell at the peak and put the money
95. 3:12straight [music] back into the next one.
96. 3:14Brighton bought Moyes Kaisedo from
97. 3:16Ecuador for a little over £4 million.
98. 3:18Two years later, they sold him to
99. 3:20Chelsea [music] for 100 million. They
100. 3:23bought Mark Kucharella for around
101. 3:25[music] 15 million and sold him to
102. 3:27Chelsea for £55 million. They signed
103. 3:30Alexis McAllister for about £7 million.
104. 3:33Watched him win a World Cup and sold him
105. 3:34to Liverpool [music] for £35 million.
106. 3:37They paid Watford 30 million for Joan
107. 3:40Pedro and sold him to Chelsea for 55
108. 3:42million. Yanpul Van Hecka arrived from
109. 3:45the Dutch second tier for roughly5
110. 3:47million and [music] left this summer for
111. 3:49Tottenham for a reported50 million.
112. 3:52Brenford ran the same operation for
113. 3:54longer. Ollie Watkins signed from Exit
114. 3:56City in League 2 [music] for under2
115. 3:58million sold to Aston Villa for 28
116. 4:00million. Ivan Tony bought from Peterbr
117. 4:03for around £5 million [music] sold for
118. 4:05£40 million. Brian and Bumo signed from
119. 4:08the French second division for less
120. 4:09than6 million sold to Manchester United
121. 4:12last summer for 65 million. And David
122. 4:14Ryer, a goalkeeper bought from Blackburn
123. 4:16for about £3 million. Sold to Arsenal
124. 4:19for around 27 million where he has just
125. 4:21kept 19 clean sheets, won a third
126. 4:24straight golden glove and become Premier
127. 4:26League's number one. A3 million
128. 4:28goalkeeper became the best [music] in
129. 4:30the country. Bournemouth arrived at the
130. 4:32model late and moved fastest of all.
131. 4:34Dominic [music] Silanki bought from
132. 4:35Chelsea for around£19 million, sold to
133. 4:38Tottenham for 65 million. Dean Hoisen
134. 4:42signed from Juventus for about 12
135. 4:44million, sold to Real Madrid for 50
136. 4:46[music] million barely a year later.
137. 4:48Milos Kerz bought for roughly 15
138. 4:50million, sold to Liverpool for [music]
139. 4:53£40 million. Ilia Zabani signed for
140. 4:55around £24 million, sold to Paris
141. 4:58Sanjerine for £54.5 million. Dango
142. 5:01Uatara bought for about 20 million sold
143. 5:03to Brenford for £42.5 million [music]
144. 5:06and Antoine Semeno signed from Bristol
145. 5:08City for roughly 10 million sold to
146. 5:11Manchester City for64 million sold in
147. 5:13[music] January in the middle of the
148. 5:15season with Bournemouth sitting
149. 5:17comfortably in the table and refusing to
150. 5:19blink. That is the whole engine in
151. 5:21[music] three clubs. Buy the player the
152. 5:23market has mispriced. Coach him until
153. 5:25the Giants come knocking and sell at the
154. 5:27peak. And here is the part that turns it
155. 5:29from a fire [music] sale into a machine.
156. 5:31The money goes straight back through the
157. 5:34model. Brighton turned the kisedo and
158. 5:35kukarella fees into the next wave
159. 5:37[music] the data flagged. Costulas,
160. 5:40ruter, vushkovich. Bournemouth took the
161. 5:42money from Madrid, Liverpool and PSG
162. 5:44[music] and spent it rebuilding the same
163. 5:46squad that qualified for Europe. Sell
164. 5:49high, reby smart, repeat. The players
165. 5:51change every year. The profit [music]
166. 5:53doesn't.
167. 5:55A single good season proves nothing. Any
168. 5:58small club can catch lightning once. A
169. 6:00hot striker, a kind fixture list, a year
170. 6:03where everything breaks, [music] right?
171. 6:04The reason this is a system and not a
172. 6:06fluke is what happens to the results
173. 6:08when you strip the luck out and watch
174. 6:10them across years. Managers and squads.
175. 6:12Brighton [music] finished sixth in 23,
176. 6:15the highest league position in their
177. 6:17121-year history [music] and reached
178. 6:19Europe for the first time ever. They
179. 6:21dipped to 11th the following season. the
180. 6:23model is not magic and they don't
181. 6:24pretend [music] it is. Then went
182. 6:26straight back to eighth twice back into
183. 6:28Europe both times. Bournemouth [music]
184. 6:29climbed year on year until they finished
185. 6:31sixth last season and qualified for the
186. 6:33Europa League. [music] Brenford held the
187. 6:35top half of midtable on one of the
188. 6:37smallest budgets in the entire division
189. 6:39and missed Europe by one place and one
190. 6:42[music] result. Now watch what those
191. 6:43finishes survived. The players leave
192. 6:45every summer. That is the whole point of
193. 6:47the model. Sell high and reload [music]
194. 6:49and the results hold anyway. and it
195. 6:51survives the manager leaving, which is
196. 6:53far harder to fake. Brighton lost Graham
197. 6:56Potter to Chelsea in 2022, lost Roberto
198. 6:58Deserby in 2024, [music]
199. 7:00and handed the team to the youngest
200. 7:02permanent manager in Premier League
201. 7:03history, and the league position barely
202. 7:05[music] moved. Brenford went further
203. 7:07still. When Thomas Frank left for
204. 7:08Tottenham last summer, they promoted
205. 7:10Keith Andrews instead, a former setpiece
206. 7:12coach who had been working inside the
207. 7:14club and who had never run a senior team
208. 7:16in his [music] life. The bet was that
209. 7:17the structure mattered more than the man
210. 7:19standing on the touchline.
211. 7:20>> [music]
212. 7:20>> Andrews took charge and Brenford
213. 7:22finished ninth, almost exactly where the
214. 7:24model said they belonged. [music] That
215. 7:26is the fingerprint of a system. Lose
216. 7:28three managers in four years and finish
217. 7:29in the same place. Sell your best player
218. 7:31mid-season and still make Europe. When
219. 7:34the people keep leaving and the results
220. 7:35keep holding, the results were never
221. 7:37really about the people. They were about
222. 7:39the method. None of this is only for
223. 7:42punching up from the bottom. The same
224. 7:44idea taken all the way once won
225. 7:46everything. Liverpool are owned by
226. 7:48Fenway Sports Group. The Americans, who
227. 7:50also own the Boston Red Sox, a baseball
228. 7:52team that broke an 86-year curse by
229. 7:55throwing out gut instinct and buying
230. 7:57players on data nobody else trusted.
231. 7:59They brought that philosophy to Anfield.
232. 8:01Michael Edwards built recruitment around
233. 8:03expected goals and undervaluation.
234. 8:05Jurgen Klopp coached what the model
235. 8:07found and what it found was
236. 8:09extraordinary. Muhammad Salah, written
237. 8:11off in England, signed from Roma and
238. 8:13turned into one of the best [music]
239. 8:14forwards on the planet. Andy Robertson
240. 8:16bought from a relegated holeside for8
241. 8:19million pounds became a worldclass left
242. 8:21back. Even the expensive calls Van
243. 8:23[music] Djk Allison were databbacked and
244. 8:25correct. That squad won the Champions
245. 8:27League in [music] 2019 and Liverpool's
246. 8:30first league title in 30 years in 2020.
247. 8:33The model didn't just help a small club
248. 8:34survive. It conquered football. Michael
249. 8:36[music] Edwards stepped back from
250. 8:38recruitment. Klopp left in 2024 and the
251. 8:40discipline left with them because it had
252. 8:42always been theirs. Last summer, with
253. 8:44new people making the decisions,
254. 8:46Liverpool spent over400 million pounds
255. 8:48in a single window. The club that proved
256. 8:50a spreadsheet could beat a checkbook
257. 8:52picked the checkbook back up [music] and
258. 8:54finished fifth, surrendering the title
259. 8:56it had just won. That is the warning the
260. 8:58rest of this story runs on. [music]
261. 8:59Liverpool never lacked money. They could
262. 9:02have bought almost anyone at almost any
263. 9:04point across that entire run. They chose
264. 9:06to buy smart instead. And they chose it
265. 9:08because a specific group of people
266. 9:10inside the club [music] believed a
267. 9:12spreadsheet could beat a checkbook. It
268. 9:14was a decision held up by the people who
269. 9:16made it. The moment those people left,
270. 9:18the decision went with them. And the
271. 9:20club did what a giant does when nobody
272. 9:23is holding the line. It's spent. If the
273. 9:25discipline couldn't outlast the two men
274. 9:27who installed it at the one rich club
275. 9:29that had already won everything with it,
276. 9:31[music] the clubs that never chose it
277. 9:32were never going to stumble into it now.
278. 9:36If the model is this well understood, if
279. 9:38the deals are public, the results are
280. 9:39public, the owners have written books
281. 9:41about it, why don't Manchester United,
282. 9:42Tottenham, and Chelsea simply do it
283. 9:45themselves. They can't. And the reason
284. 9:46they can't is written into every
285. 9:48transfer in this video. The Giants don't
286. 9:50build [music] the system. They buy its
287. 9:52outputs at a markup. Chelsea are the
288. 9:54clearest case in the sport. They paid
289. 9:56Brighton 100 million for Kaisedo and £55
290. 9:59million for Cucarella. The exact two
291. 10:01players the model had found for a
292. 10:03combined 20 million. They are not
293. 10:05copying Brighton's recruitment. They are
294. 10:07paying Brighton's recruitment at five
295. 10:09times the price after the risk is gone.
296. 10:11Tottenham paid Bournemouth [music]
297. 10:13£65 million for Salanki and then went
298. 10:15back for Vaneka from Brighton.
299. 10:17Manchester United paid [music] Brenford
300. 10:19£65 million for Rumo. Every one of those
301. 10:22clubs had the same data, the same
302. 10:24scouts, the same chance to sign those
303. 10:26players when they were cheap. They
304. 10:27didn't. They waited until a smaller,
305. 10:29smarter club [music] had proven the
306. 10:31player and then paid the premium. The
307. 10:32model demands things a giant cannot
308. 10:35stomach. It demands patience. It demands
309. 10:37selling your best [music] player every
310. 10:38summer and trusting that the next one is
311. 10:40already in the building. It demands
312. 10:42backing a number on a screen over a
313. 10:43famous name the fans want on the back of
314. 10:45a shirt. And it demands surviving the
315. 10:47fury [music]
316. 10:48from supporters, from television, from
317. 10:50your own boardroom when you sell the
318. 10:52star and sign someone nobody has heard
319. 10:54of. A club watched by 100 million
320. 10:57people, judged every weekend, cannot
321. 10:59absorb that. The edge doesn't survive
322. 11:01because it's secret. [music] Everyone
323. 11:02can see it. It survives because it is
324. 11:04culturally almost impossible to copy.
325. 11:07[music]
326. 11:08Every fee in this video points the same
327. 11:10direction. Chelsea's 100 million went to
328. 11:13Brighton. Real Madrid's £50 million went
329. 11:15to Bournemouth, Tottenham's£65 million,
330. 11:18United's£65 million, Liverpool's40
331. 11:22million. All of it flowed down the table
332. 11:24from the clubs with everything to the
333. 11:26clubs with almost nothing. [music] The
334. 11:28Giants have become the data club's most
335. 11:30reliable customers. That is what makes
336. 11:32this permanent. The Giants impatience is
337. 11:35the small club's income, [music] and
338. 11:37every pound the Giants spend trying to
339. 11:39close the gap widens it. So the
340. 11:41transfers that look like these clubs
341. 11:43being torn apart are these clubs [music]
342. 11:45cashing in. The money only travels one
343. 11:47way down the table from the clubs that
344. 11:50have everything to the clubs that keep
345. 11:52beating them with it. The giants pay,
346. 11:54the smaller clubs climb, and the next
347. 11:56player nobody has noticed yet is already
348. 11:59in the building. Bought with [music]
349. 12:00someone else's fortune waiting to be
350. 12:02sold back up the line. Subscribe to Mega
351. 12:05Football. Hit the bell and we'll see you
352. 12:07soon.