I would usually shit on transfers like this but f**k it, ive given up
I'm backing this guy.
My new favourite player.
I'm having Hednesford on the back of my top
by Cripps » Thu Jan 05, 2017 5:34 pm
by Arsene Nose » Thu Jan 05, 2017 6:00 pm
by gooney » Fri Jan 06, 2017 3:06 pm
by TOP » Fri Jan 06, 2017 3:19 pm
by Sims » Fri Jan 06, 2017 3:46 pm
by CrimsonGunner11 » Fri Jan 06, 2017 4:58 pm
ARSENAL EXCLUSIVE: How non-league star moved to Emirates... behind scenes on transfer deal
"WE'VE an e-mail from a league scout saying I was wasting their time... now our player is at Arsenal." JACK WILSON lifts the lid on how COHEN BRAMALL went from non-league obscurity to the Emirates.
You probably won’t have heard of Cohen Bramall. You certainly wouldn’t have heard of Dan Chapman.
The former worked in a Bentley car factory in Crewe until being made redundant, then moved to a clothes shop. The latter has just helped complete the biggest shock deal of the transfer window.
When Chapman, a senior partner at sports law team Full Contact, turned up at Hednesford Town in August, few could have predicted the result. He was there to watch an Evo-Stik Northern Premier League clash - that’s the seventh tier of English football - after being handed a tip-off on a player.
Chapman has moved more than 60 players from non-league to Football League in the past five years - Che Adams and Freddie Ladipo, to Sheffield United and Crystal Palace, are two of them. All going well, said player would perform, impress Chapman and come under his wing.
“My colleague Lee Payne and I went to watch Hednesford play away very early on this season,” Chapman says. “We were there to watch a player from the home team. In our business we get intelligence from all manner of sources, and often it can be very good or it can be very wrong.”
On this occasion it was a dud. The tip-off had a shocker.
“I’ll be honest, 99 times out of 100 I go to games and end up leaving at half-time, depressed,” Chapman says. “You are left to drive four hours home reflecting on another wasted trip - but there’s that odd time where you see someone and that’s what it’s all about.
“It was at this game where we first saw Cohen live. We saw him play again and thought ‘this lad has got something’ - but there are many players who can shine once or twice. A very trusted scout we work with watched him a lot for us and a pattern started to emerge – we knew we had something a little special.
“When we first saw him play we thought he reminded us of a young Ashley Cole. He had pace, he’s a good size, he could bomb up and down and he could cross. He has natural flair and technique, which has never been coached. He had got an awful lot of good attributes.”
Chapman introduced himself, Cohen agreed to come under his wing and the seeds to a big deal were unknowingly sown.
On the pitch, the 20-year-old was beginning to turn more heads. A stunning Rabona assist went viral on the web and it began to look like Chapman and his right-hand man Payne were right - this natural talent had it.
“Cohen is instinctively a talented footballer - but he was always more into athletics and sprinting,” Chapman says. “He didn’t realise the Rabona assist was unusual. I rang him the next day to talk about it and he couldn’t see what the fuss was all about. In his eyes, he just crossed the ball and was pleased the forward nodded it home.
“His manager at Hednesford knew him from the local non-league scene at a lower level and wanted him to come with him when he got the job. Only this summer has he really started taking football seriously.”
Chapman was touching base with Football League clubs to discuss Bramall - without much luck. He had a gem on his hands but, initially, no-one wanted to know.
“We’ve got an e-mail from a league scout saying I was wasting their time for suggesting a player from the Evo-Stik League,” he smiles. “Another club, three miles from his house, didn’t want him as they said he wasn’t good enough.”
But Arsenal - the Premier League giants - thought otherwise. They had seen enough in this rough diamond to want him to train with them - not with the reserves, but in the first team. He was now up against Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil - not that he knew who they were.
“Cohen doesn’t come from a football background. When he went into Arsenal training, he didn’t really know who each of the players were!” Chapman says. “We asked him how he got on against certain players and he didn’t know at first which ones they were. But it helped, in a way. It meant he wasn’t overawed. Many young lads would just fall apart in that environment so all credit to him for not doing so."
A move progressed quicker than Chapman could have imagined. Bramall was at Arsenal on Christmas Eve and the club allowed him to return home for Christmas Day. But they didn’t want Bramall to get into bad habits and called him back immediately a day later.
Brian McDermott had been hunting the globe for months to find a left-back. Now they had the most unlikely of answers.
“Arsene Wenger wants hungry young players in back-up and that’s where Cohen fits in,” Chapman says. “I’ve seen a lot of social media comments from Arsenal fans wondering why they are signing a non-league guy but they’re missing the point. Arsenal are signing a player based on his attributes and potential, not where he has been. Their recruitment team were tasked with finding a young left-sided player and they have been searching around Europe for a gem now for a year. They couldn’t find someone - until this lad came up.”
The rise has been quick - even for a man used to a 100-metre sprint. Bramall is now a Premier League player. The contract has been signed, the £40,000 paid to Hednesford, the deal is done.
But how has a man with the talent to impress Arsene Wenger and Arsenal gone unnoticed? Why hadn’t someone moved sooner? Why, only now, has he got his big chance
The answer, Chapman says, is simple.
“Nowadays the majority of top level recruitment seems to be driven by data and computer analysis.” he says. “There are excellent platforms such as Wyscout and Scout7 that all the pro clubs use. They are amazing – they can work out how far every player has run, how many times they’ve given the ball away, edit out all of the player’s highlights and lowlights. If you want to watch a left-back in Finland, you can. You don’t have to leave your desk.
“It’s great but it’s not going to unearth a gem like you can in non-league. These online systems are not filming games down in the non-league. That’s where the gap in the market is.”
So computers are one reason. But plain laziness, Chapman says, is another.
“The truth is a lot people in scouting are lazy. They don’t think it’s attractive to come down to a club in the non-leagues as they are not likely to see anything of interest - so they don’t bother.
“If we took that attitude, we would not find players like Cohen. There are some brilliant, hard-working scouts out there who do go to these games and who do recommend these players. I know of one league club scout who urged his club to sign Cohen. The first-team manager was just not interested and would always want to sign players he knows or has at least heard of.”
There is one man who is different - Barry Fry. But he’s the exception to the rule.
“To his credit, Barry Fry does it. That’s why Peterborough sign so many from non-league because of him. He goes out there to games and watches players himself. He is still out there putting the miles in and grafting away. Fleetwood have been doing it well for a while, too.
“But the others? Not really. The sad reality is a lot of people in player recruitment are lazy and a lot of clubs are missing out on gems all the time. It worries us how many outstanding prospects are out there, like Cohen, who are just not getting picked up. Our mission is to find as many of them as we can.”
by gooney » Fri Jan 06, 2017 6:12 pm
by Marsbar100 » Fri Jan 06, 2017 6:29 pm
by Arsenal Tone » Fri Jan 06, 2017 7:06 pm
by TrafalgarLaw » Fri Jan 06, 2017 8:26 pm
by Sims » Fri Jan 06, 2017 8:39 pm
TrafalgarLaw wrote:Feels weird how there seem to be quite a number of footballers who hardly know anything about it in general, just like when Sanchez didn't know who Gundogan was
by realtalk » Fri Jan 06, 2017 9:22 pm
TrafalgarLaw wrote:Feels weird how there seem to be quite a number of footballers who hardly know anything about it in general, just like when Sanchez didn't know who Gundogan was
by Marsbar100 » Fri Jan 06, 2017 10:11 pm
Sims wrote:TrafalgarLaw wrote:Feels weird how there seem to be quite a number of footballers who hardly know anything about it in general, just like when Sanchez didn't know who Gundogan was
its cos theyre all thick as shit
remember people lauding frank lampard cause he had some gcse's for fucks sake
by CrimsonGunner11 » Sat Jan 07, 2017 12:08 am
Cohen Bramall: Arsenal's new recruit revels in 'crazy' Premier League move
Cohen Bramall - Arsenal's unlikely new recruit - is attempting to sum up a whirlwind few weeks.
One minute the 20-year-old is working at a car plant while playing part-time for Hednesford Town in the Northern Premier League, the next he's training at a Premier League club.
"I was working in Crewe for Bentley Motors," he tells BBC Sport.
"I was on the production line, filling up cars with gasses, brake fluid, washer fluid and all that. Day in day out, Monday to Friday, 6.30am until 5.15pm.
"I enjoyed it but when you're doing those shifts, then training on Tuesday and Thursday, going from Crewe to Birmingham, and playing on Saturday it's pretty tiring."
But his busy schedule hit a setback just days before Christmas.
"I got made redundant by Bentley on the Tuesday [20 December], which was crazy because I didn't know what I was going to do," he explains.
"I needed a full-time wage coming in, not a part-time wage from Hednesford, so I started thinking of getting a new job."
The following day, however, his world was turned upside down.
"My agent rings me on the Wednesday saying you've got a trial at Arsenal," Bramall recalls. "I was like 'what?' - I was gobsmacked.
"He said pack your stuff and get to this postcode, so I packed all my stuff in about an hour, got there as fast as I could, slept for a bit, then the next minute I'm in training with the first team.
"It was crazy how quick everything happened, how I met everyone and they just took me straight in. I had to take the opportunity with both hands."
Crewe-born Bramall started playing semi-professional football for Kidsgrove Athletic as a 17-year-old, and had spells at Newcastle Town, Market Drayton and Nantwich.
He was picked up at Hednesford by then manager Liam McDonald, who has likened Bramall's story to that of striker Jamie Vardy, who went from non-league to Premier League champion with Leicester in the space of four years.
Crystal Palace and Sheffield Wednesday had both watched the promising left-back closely, but it was Arsenal who agreed terms on the £40,000 deal and made Bramall's dreams come true.
"Two weeks ago, I played for Sheffield Wednesday in an Under-23s game against Birmingham City," Bramall says.
"Brian McDermott, one of the scouts at Arsenal came down. He doesn't really come down to those sort of games, he's always abroad and looking at the next star. If he wasn't there it wouldn't have happened.
"I would tell the whole of non-league to just keep believing and keep working hard. If you don't work hard it's not coming. You need to work hard, you need to put 110% into it and believe in yourself, stay confident, stay humble and keep going."
"I came up to Arsenal, I get my kit, I get ready and I'm expecting to go out with the Under-23s, but I was training with the first team," he recalls.
"It was insane. You see people on social media, you see them on Match of the Day, then you see them in real life and your heart's pounding. It was crazy.
"Danny Welbeck, Chuba Akpom, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain - all top guys who are dead welcoming and they knew my name. I was gobsmacked. I was so happy that they knew my name and honoured to play against those players. It was just a dream come true.
"I think the first one-two I did was with Alexis Sanchez."
"It wasn't really a conversation, it was a quick shake of the hand. A 'Hi, nice to meet you, Cohen' and a quick chuckle, really," he says.
"It was unbelievable seeing him. One of the top, top managers in the world. You see him on TV a lot, then you see him face-to-face and it's 'wow'. It blows your mind, mate.
"It was two days of training, a quick two-day session with the first-team and then we just spoke about what's going to happening next.
"I haven't even had time to reflect on what's really happened. It hasn't even hit me where I am.
"I just need to forget who I train with and work on me, my personality, my body and mentality. I know I'm around with the stars but I need to do the best I can and try and not get trapped in that frame of mind where I'm with all the big dogs.
"It's an honour to play with them but I need to do what's best for me."