Sunderland Thread

If you google "Benham" or "Rasmus Ankerssen" there are a few articles out there. This one is a bit old, but it's one of the best (imo):

(Apparently Benham hates the term "Moneyball" - there's much more to his approach than that - but it's an American article, where they're all in thrall to Billy Bean etc)

Anyhow since then they've modified some of their ideas, as well as introducing new ones all the time.

I particularly like their player recruitment, where Benham's company monitors literally thousands of players all over the world on behalf of Brentford. And it goes far beyond mere statistics, or even having their scouts watch prospective signings dozens of times, as the article points out.

They also go deep into a player's background to check whether he has the right temperament and attitude etc, so that it doesn't matter how talented or affordable he is, if he's a bad influence, he doesn't get signed.

Thomas Frank (Head Coach) calls it the "No Dickheads Rule"

Green Devil wrote: For sure, parachute payments are big business but as you've mentioned promotion can be done without them also and a well ran club who are patient can achieve great things (which is the way I want Sunderland to go) Again, being in League 1 and learning (hopefully) from the mistakes of yesteryear can give Sunderland a new lease of life and a chance to build a solid platform for years to come, something the club couldn't do in the PL. I'm actually fairly optimistic for the future.

It is 10 years since Benham bought full control of the club (he had been a benefactor before then). The stability and long term planning he's brought is absolutely key to building that platform.

There are only a bare handful of clubs in the entire 92 who can match Brentford in this respect eg it's taken them nearly 15 years to find a local, affordable site for their new stadium and negotiate the absolute nightmare of getting planning permission to proceed. But until the virus struck, they were comfortably on course to move in for the start of next season and they might still do, depending on how it goes.