00:00Do Brentford even need a manager?
00:02Owner Matthew Benham has made a career of building analytical data-driven models,
00:05so it's no surprise he implements similar strategies at the club.
00:09But if these models can already tell them who the new manager should be,
00:13it's been pretty successful at that,
00:14tell recruitment who to sign,
00:16tell the team which passing pattern or set-piece routine
00:18produces the highest expected goals against a specific opponent,
00:22then picking a starting 11 is technically just one more task for a computer to solve, right?
00:2611 names, thousands of historical data points on player skill, form, history, fatigue.
00:32Why hasn't the club just handed the info to the algorithm and let it pick the team?
00:35Well, I think there's two reasons, communication and translation.
00:39A model can tell you which centre-forward is statistically the best source of goals
00:42against a mid-block defence,
00:44but can it get that message across in a tense dressing room?
00:47Use emotion as a tool.
00:49Understand brief eye contact and body language in the 30 seconds before kick-off
00:53when a manager decides whether to say something or nothing at all.
00:56And can it take the cold, precise output of a data department
00:59and translate it into easily digestible, clear and concise instructions
01:03that the players can believe in and execute under real pressure?
01:06I don't think so.
01:08Not yet anyways.
01:09It might seem like a far-fetched idea for now,
01:11but the way football is developing,
01:12don't be surprised to see an AI manager at some point.
