9 Questions with Tom Decroos

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 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 Tom Decroos:

What is your first memory of football?

Zidane’s legendary headbutt in the 2006 world cup final.

What attracted you to data and scouting? What’s more intriguing now, refining your processes and acumen or 'discovering' players?

Rather than being attracted to it, I just kind of rolled into it almost by chance. I am at heart a computer scientist with a passion for AI. Football data has always been just a fun domain to play around in. Therefore refining the processes is definitely more intriguing for me than discovering players.

What is the biggest misconception/cliche regarding recruitment you’ve found in this space?

Given that I don’t work in recruitment, but simply build analytical tools that recruiters might find useful, I don’t feel qualified to answer this question. However, one thing that annoys me in general about soccer is how much people do not take the randomness of soccer into account. The outcome of a match is generally decided by a few key moments in that match in which luck can play a huge part. 

When a team is somewhat lucky or unlucky in the key moments of 3-4 games in a row; then players, coaches and media tend to build imaginary narratives around this rather than just acknowledge that the team had some good or bad luck.

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

One gap in my skillset is that I rely on data provided to me by friends or colleagues. I have no experience in collection football data myself. Hence, if I had to start over, I would focus a bit more on being able to collect data myself; whether by building connections or scraping websites.

What is more important domain knowledge or curiosity?

As a scientist I have to vote 100% for curiosity. Without curiosity, who will ever expand the existing domain knowledge? How will you ever gain a competitive advantage over your opponents if all you know is what is already widely known?

What is more useful in analytics - breadth of skills or depth of talent? Why?

It depends on what role in analytics you want to fill. If you want to do more practical work at a football club or recruitment agency, you are probably better off with a breadth of skills. If you want to discover fundamental new insights within football, probably a depth of talent.

What three (3) football icons would you want to have a meal with? Why?

Pep Guardiola

Jürgen Klopp

Lionel Messi

Pep and Jürgen because I’d like to learn what makes them such great coaches. What do they know and understand about football that us mere mortals don’t.

Messi because I would like to ask him where he is going to play next season. 

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

Do a PhD! On the one hand, people in the football analytics space do not always take you seriously because you are “just a student”. On the other hand, you get to work in (football) analytics with a stable income and you get to build your skills for four years, many of which will be transferable to areas other than football analytics.

Also, learn to program. People who do not know how to program have no idea how much easier their lives become when they obtain a basic understanding of python or R.

What is your favorite quote or saying?

“There's something here that doesn't make sense. Let's go and poke it with a stick.” – Doctor Who