Today, Arsenal released a statement that 55 redundancies in their staff would be let go. It was received with mixed reactions as these type of decisions often are.
Shortly after this statement was released, Daily Mail, released an article saying that head of international scouting, and long time Arsenal success story, Francis Cagigao was one of the people found “redundant”.
Cagigao has been one of Arsenal’s greatest assets and been at the forefront of successful scouting with names attached to him like:
- Cesc Fabregas
- Robin van Persie
- Hector Bellerin
- Santi Cazorla
- Jose Antonio Reyes
- Lauren
- Alexis Sanchez
- Gabriel Martinelli
- Emi Martinez
- William Saliba
And many more.
While the report has not been corroborated by the club, it does align itself with the shifting internal changed in the direction of agent-based recruitment and away from scout-based. During the break, it was announced that Arsenal had let go of 10 scouts, but that those were mostly youth scouts with the intention of putting more focus on finding first team players like they did with Martinelli or Saliba.
To see Arsenal’s most successful scout be asked to leave during this may be the ultimate worry for anyone that despises the club’s attachment to super agents like Kia Joorabcian who seems to have won the fight for Raul’s ear.
With the removal of scouts, Cagigao, and the parting ways between Arsenal and StatDNA’s Rosenfeld, Arsenal seem to have made it clearer than ever where they stand.
