Once upon a time, Salzburg send a plane to make a teenage Ousmane Dembélé visit the facilities, turn his head forcing his club to freeze him out before finally offering a new contract.

Sometimes, French club offer a “competitive wage” contract with no incentive, then throw the teenage player in the mud for being “ill advised” and “money chaser”. Isaac Lihadji, but really, there’s one soap opera every summer and the narrative arc / briefs are comical moreso for how predictable they are, than conductive to a good image of the industry.

Some players refuse the golden ticket, and move elsewhere: Sofiane Diop, Wilson Isidor from Rennes to Monaco (breaking the non-aggression pact between French clubs – is Monaco France?), or Willem Guebbels turning his nose at Lyon who paid for Dutch lessons – for Monaco.

Missing the 2015 League Cup final to attend a R16 of French Youth Cup, and Ousmane Dembélé – frozen out – with the U19 for a 1-0 Rennes Win.

🔹There’s a sweet spot where clubs put young players on display, under 10 games that’s enough to build an incomplete picture. Barcelona know more than Chelsea do – that’s a fact.

🔹That’s also not a market (🇪🇸) where you have a network of neutral stakeholders to enquire with (coaches, agents, onlookers), who coached, played against him.

🍋See Akerlov’s lemons The Market for ‘Lemons’: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism

📰Akerlof examines how the quality of goods traded in a market can degrade in the presence of information asymmetry between buyers and sellers, which ultimately leaves goods that are found to be defective after purchase in the market.

🔹There is not a world where the new Rooney / Van Basten is hidden in Barcelona B with a release clause of 6 million. Probably not a world where he’s only identified by the same back office who signs every left footed right winger on the market – but surprisingly no left winger, after spunking 100 million on Mudryk.

🔹Selling clubs prefer taking 6 million now, as opposed to 20 million “maybe” doesn’t show a lot of trust in the players’ ability to succeed at professional level. Tells you everything you need to know, even if that’s not written in capital letters.

🔹The market demographic of “powerful Academy strikers” is the one that has the biggest fail rate, for a combination of all factors mentioned here:

• Not developping their game, and playing against actual adult sized defenders

• Not trusted to peak at 24-26 like every Drogba, Guirassy, Solanke did, and discarded by half competent clubs.

• The way academies hoard every player they can take a quick buck on, suggests that releasing a “good player” suggest they’re either very incompetent (therefore why would you get a player who spent over a decade in a dysfunctiuonal organisation), or have more data points than you do.

🔬SNAPSHOT PLAYER BREAKDOWN: STIFFER ARM?

🗺️👀infographic in three key points

🪸🗺️STIFFER ARM: for a “target man” powerful striker, out of a dozen of instances. Guiu only uses his arm to shield / create his personal space once.

Doesn’t on every other instance, including academy football.

Consequence: shanked shots, easy to put off balance and thrown down the stairs by the CB happy to barge him onto a team mate.

Recipe for turnovers, red cards and concussions at senior level.

🪸🗺️DODGING CHALLENGES: the challenge for talent pool outliers is to scale up and stay on track. Finding separation for unicorn midfielders isn’t necessary at Academy level, nor is barging defenders for strong strikers.

– The more results-savvy Academy coaches hoard them to win their tinpot youth leagues (Timo Werner’s movement off the ball is shambolic, but he also scored 60 goals in two seasons at U17-U19 level in Germany), the more players develop bad habits that make them have it hard to adapt once they reach the pitch that does matter.

Timo Werner’s games / goals / assists / minutes per goal.

As opposed to a “what you see is what you get” forward.

Cameron Archer does what he does. Separation movement, runs in behind, see the passer and the goal and don’t compete in duels he’s got no chance to win.

🪸🗺️RECEPTIONS BACK TO GOAL: English Football is a different beast, receptions are prepared before getting the ball and the less surface presented to defenders the better for players’ integrity.

Marc Guiu receives flat, will get elbowed and shoved between shoulders, and get tackled between the legs.

Will fall over the ball, and will struggle to build trust from his team mates who will clock the dissonance between what he looks like (big boi – get hold) and what he actually doesn’t do.

Ellis Simms vs Malachi Fagan-Walcott, never receive square: on the side with one leg to stay firm (back one), and get a touch with the front one to keep the ball as far away from the defender. The picture captures a moment in the motion, not exactly the one described.
But basically, the defender is baited into grabbing the striker to move him out the way, tangle a leg and clip the planted (back) leg, or lunge for a red card tackle to try to reach the ball. Which is out of reach if the ball is kept under the front foot soles, even with long legs.

🪸FINISHING: Guiu is an alright finisher, shoots hard with both feet. Speed of execution to trigger shots is medium good. Not average, not great. Hasn’t found the balance between power and accuracy.

💥WHERE TO FIND RATTLING 9s

🔹Marc Guiu is an outlier in his talent pool: every population has tall/strong/quick or generally;

— ectomorph (tall thin);

— mesomorph (regular joe);

— endomorph (big boi – Guiu).

🔹Local football culture (playing style) defines priorities, scouting criteria and utimately player pathways. That’s the famous “we have 5 Wilshere in La Masia” from Pep Guardiola when a 19 year old Jack Wilshere ragdolled Busquets for 90’.

Sour grapes?

🔹What makes Marc Guiu stand out from🔵Ellis Sims (2001) who scored 41 in 44 at U18 level, and 17 in 40 at U21 level? He’s now a solid Championship striker.

Ellis Simms? Yes, *the* Ellis Simms who scored his only Premier League goal against Thomas Tuchel’s players: Koulibaly, 32 on 200k a week. And Kepa, given another “fresh start” by Tuchel at Zagreb.

For anyone wondering why diligent yet fun dude Todd Boehly doesn’t call the shots anymore after handing out Tuchel 350 millions to build a squad that went on to finish 12th with the 3rd wagebill.

Ellis Simms was the Oldham Osimhen at Academy level for Everton.

More importantly, was able to floor defenders with an arm whilst rolling them, such as that goal in November 2018 aged 17 years in the narrow 10-0 win against West Brom.

🔹is Guiu standing out for how good he is, or what he looks like? Neal Maupay started at 16 in 🇫🇷Ligue 1; would he make it in 🇦🇷 Primera División?

🔹Massive cognitive biais Chelsea already fell into: Oriol Romeu is Busquets with Roy Keane’s PL physicality. Assuming he’s “outlier” x La Masia

He was the chorizo Lee Cattermole 🌭 often acting up and gifting goals by gambling half turns ahead of his own box when not going through people with a rash tackle.

Always interesting when players brainwashed with “positional play” don’t know their place.

🔹Playing style wise, I’m intrugued at the mindset / mismatch between a striker that plays like a non League striker: always turning to drive and shoot (it’s a wonder how he got through the La Masia curriculum – maybe he’s stubborn which is kinda good for a striker)

…And Maresca’s zealotism to ask the 9 to drop off the front to lay the ball back, according to the staff’s burner account which makes for some interesting reading.

Because why would you make it hard for opposing teams to prepare games, if you can beg tactico accounts for RTs on social media providing scoreboard-free HD footage (that not even WyScout has access to – if you wonder where it comes from).

🔹There’s one layoff in the entire video, hit like a baseball home run with 3 bounces.

is Guiu a “baller” ? we shall see.

🔹Guiu looks to score a header in the game George Ilenikhena scored. We haven’t been linked with him yet; no point in claiming that the purpose of a system is to do what it constantly fails to do.

Duran, Olise, Ilenikhena, Onana, Osimhen are right there.

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If you benchmark with existing Chelsea strikers: Donnell McNeilly (2005) uses his left arm a lot more to protect his own space. So does Shim Mheuka (2007).

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Both McNeilly and Mheuka are much more accurate finishing wise, and their speed of execution is quicker. These are observational facts, not opinions.

Shim Mheuka scoring against Spain at the U17 Euros, phenomenal execution before the centreback can hit F5 “refresh”.

Donnell McNeilly qualifying a 10v11 Chelsea U18 squad in the FA Youth Cup, with a strong footwork to adjust laterally before curling a finish in the inside netting (“the rope”) showing a great deal of work to get such a clean / consistent motion.

No parasite arm movement, off balance, one in a million top corner goal.

There’s relative and absolute abilities.
Relative depend on the quality of the defending (top level defender squeeze in quicker and leave less gaps)
Absolute relates to the quickness of execution, that the trained eye is able to project against better defenders.

This viz is a still picture, players are bound to get better over time but margins are tight.

Fernando Torres was a menace behind defences, and marginally became alright as a targetman in his late Chelsea years to receive back to goal and flick in the air (was always a tremendous unopposed header).

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Perspective: level wise, Guiu stands between Championship bench filler like Sekou Mara (another outlier in the French pool because stronger and only focused on shooting / scoring / pressing), or League One backup striker level.

An over-reliance on Jackson will create a strain that Guiu doesn’t seem to be able to adress right now to rotate / impact games especially in matchups he’s supposed to be good at.

Should be loaned in League One – where Dean Scarlett couldn’t get off the bench at Portsmouth. Another big boi striker supposed to roll and barge defenders.

Why would another club develop a striker that’s not his, considering that there’s no value for them in terms of re-sale value. And knowing that even if you have a Omari Hutchinson season, there’ll be four players bought in the same season (Angelo, Paez, Palmer, Estevao, the Strasbourg winger).

What about Dujuan Richards? Considering only signings’ pathway matter apparently

Premier League clubs would be wiser to put their players on show just enough to draw interest, then sell them after a dozen / fifteen games to mid-table Premier League sides.

I’ve watched a lot of PL2 and PDL games this season, and would be intrigued at what a “blind scouting” experiment would look like: a team of trialists, 1-11 jerseys, no name, no game sheet, no date of birth and see what the consensus would funnel towards. In England. “which non league Isthmian League club was he at last season?”

Guiu will probably play “in and around the first team squad” which is hardly the pitch / brief you want to be associated with an actual first team signing and already tells you everything you need to know if ever need was felt.

Daniel Sturridge was a young first team signing (from a £5m tribunal fee), showed his worth in 2009-10 (with electric cameos), 2010-11 (with 7 goals in 11 games for Bolton) and 2011-12 (11 goals from open play including 10 in half a season).

We shall see.

That snapshot set of notes focused on three key aspects, but mostly evergreen occurences in the “PDP scouting” picture. The ball doesn’t lie, and more expectations / PR don’t get players any better, nor keeps toxicity at bay.

Ugochukwu floating above the surface at Bournemouth, Newcastle and other cameos despite being a quick, technical, heading, ground covering CM who dominated the park against PSG is indicative of the step that the Premier League represents.

Midfielders can hide in pockets or drop in nameless areas of the pitch and let their other one or two counterpart do 130% of the job, but Strikers can’t really avoid the two penalty boxes (one on top of the other) beside statpadding layoffs in the centre circle.

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