11 Questions with Sancho Quinn

The pursuit of wisdom in any walk of life quickly reveals that what you think you know is not nearly enough to get you to where you want to go. As I'm starting out in my football scouting journey I challenged myself to reach out to those already working in various roles in football to answer a short list of questions. My goal wasn't to get answers but relevant perspectives on the game within the game.

Here is Sancho Quinn:

How did your first opportunity in football come about?

I guess being proactive and a lot of luck really. I had a background in sport and had completed a Sport Science and Coaching degree and then worked as a PE/classroom teacher for 2 years. I fancied a change in career and was fortunate to have a friend who worked as a performance analyst, he was at Derby at the time and let me come in and see how the job worked. 

From there I fired out a load of emails to any analysts at clubs I could get details for and was lucky enough to get to visit Liverpool’s academy, again to get some insight/advice. I secured a place on a Performance Analysis Masters course and just started applying to any opportunities at clubs – I was incredibly lucky to get the role initially at West Ham, looking back now, I think that was one of the first ones I applied to.

What attracted you to media/data/scouting? What’s more intriguing now names or numbers?

Always been a big football obsessive so I’ll talk about what got me into the data side initially. I got quite heavily into basketball at uni, I’d be watching games until the early hours and checking the box scores religiously in the morning. One of the metrics in the box score is a simple +/-. Basically, it shows when x player is on the court, who many points are the team net up or down? 

Draymond Green, now a max-contract superstar, would be fairly unspectacular on the court and on the box scores at the time; 4 points, 3 rebounds, maybe a block. But he seemed to almost always be team-high when it came to +/-. Whatever it was he was doing on the court was having a big impact on team performance. I guess it made me think about how data can give you some information you might not get from your eyes, and how concepts like this could be applied to other sports. I find the data side really interesting but its no replacement for actually watching games.

What type of player fascinates you? What caught your eye?

This is hard. The beauty of sport is there are so many different styles and skillsets to enjoy. I love dribblers, I love players who can make the killer pace, I like insane athletes, I like players who do their job with minimal fuss and metronomic efficiency. I guess the joy of sport is watching someone much better than you do the things that you’d love to be able to do.

What is the biggest misconception you’ve found in this space?

Those that think it’s watching spreadsheets vs watching games. It’s using both well that can give you an edge.

If you could start over what skill would you build on first?

Programming skills definitely. Robust programming skills, a deep understanding of football (coaching concepts, tactics etc) and the ability to effectively communicate with data people and football people is hugely valuable and will become more and more sought after within clubs. Those same soft and hard skills would set you up brilliantly for a job outside of football too. I would have done coaching badges to at least UEFA B too.

What is more important domain knowledge or curiosity?

The answer to these either-or questions is always somewhere in the middle. But I think it’s curiosity more so. We all have to start somewhere when it comes to developing domain knowledge. If you are really interested in a subject, you can get to a good level of competency with enough effort. The learning resources are out there. I’m as bad as anyone when it comes to this. I’ve been wanting to fully commit to learning Python for ages. Time to take my own advice I think!

What is your favorite sports moment? Why?

I can think of a few individual goals that meant a lot to me. But I think I would have to go for Leicester winning the league for this. Just the most amazing, impossible achievement. Non-football wise, what Ben Stokes did in the World Cup final and then the Ashes last year was just astonishing. I feel sorry for the non-cricket fans who didn’t get to enjoy what was probably the most dramatic extended periods of sport I’ve ever seen!

What coach or player would you give a lifetime contract to? Why?

Dennis Bergkamp can come back and play for Arsenal now.

What advice would you give to someone wanting to get into this space?

I’ll advise on getting a role at a club, as a I think that’s what a lot of people would be interested in. It’s not the only route in, but the following blueprint would put you in an amazing position to get hired, I think:

-        Sport Science degree

-        Masters degree, within some kind of data field (Sports science, data science, maths, Statistics, Performance Analysis etc)

-        Coaching badges to UEFA B or higher

-        Learn R/Python and the associated data viz skills

Who is your favorite athlete? Why?

Messi. Best to ever do it.

What is your favorite quote or saying?

“If you don’t believe you can do it, then you have no chance at all.” – Arsene Wenger