Recruitment Analyst

What the role involves

• Build shortlists from data and video
• Evaluate players against role profiles
• Prepare data for recruitment meetings

Ways in, with or without formal qualifications

Experience, knowledge and interests count in football. These routes are what people in this role commonly point to.

• Self-built

  Build a public football data portfolio

  Use open and public football data to produce analysis, models and visualisations that you can show. A well-explained project proves skill without any certificate.

• Self-built

  Build a scouting-report portfolio

  Watch live matches or video, write structured player reports and publish a sample. A clear portfolio is the main thing hiring managers ask scouts for.

• Experience

  Work as a match data collector

  Data companies hire part-time collectors to tag matches from video. It teaches how events are defined and opens routes into data and analysis jobs.

Qualifications and licences

These can strengthen an application but are not a gate.

• Short course

  Data & Analytics Courses (SQL, Python, Machine Learning)

  Short courses and certificates in data skills. Their value comes from the projects you complete with them, especially football-based projects.

• Degree

  Performance Analysis or Sports Analytics Degree

  Degrees designed for sports analysts, mixing video analysis, statistics and coaching knowledge. Helpful for analyst roles but not the only door.

• Degree

  Degree in Any Subject

  Many football employers ask for a degree in any subject as a screening requirement for graduate-level jobs. The subject matters less than evidence of skills and football involvement.

Skills and knowledge

• Event Data Analysis
• Statistics & Modelling
• Player Evaluation
• Data Visualisation

Tools you may use

• Event-data providers
• Scouting video platforms
• Python
• SQL

Where this role is found

• Top-flight clubs
• Lower-league & semi-professional clubs
• Data & analytics companies

Where this role leads

• Head of Recruitment

  Not needed

  Runs the recruitment process that combines scouting, data and negotiation.

• Football Data Scientist

  Strongly preferred

  Builds models to support recruitment, performance and injury decisions.

• Loan & Player Pathway Manager

  Helpful

  Manages players out on loan and their development pathway.

Common stepping stones into this role

• Match Data Collector
• Professional Scout

Pay and context by region

Illustrative estimates scaled from a UK baseline. Check local job adverts and union or association data.