Newcastle United have begun scouting for next season in the Premier League and have around 500 names on a long list of potential incomings, according to the Chronicle.
The Newcastle-based newspaper claim that the Magpies have got rid of their old recruitment strategy under Graham Carr and replaced it with a more stats-driven approach.
The Chronicle report that this more technological strategy has seen several staff members move around and several new scouts hired by the club, with a scouting centre now set up at the training ground.
Manager Rafa Benitez is quoted as saying: “We have improved and changed the scouting department a little bit in terms of moving people around. We have a lot of systems now with stats.
“We see games on TV and also have people travelling around Europe and travelling around the world, it depends on the player. We have enough scouts in Europe and we now have two scouts in Spain.
As previously reported by the Chronicle, Newcastle have also hired permanent scouts in Eastern Europe, with the Magpies now having eyes in Hungary, Croatia and Slovenia, as well as Spain.
The club are said to be looking for players to add to their development squad after several young talents were informed they were to be released this summer.
OPINION
It looks as though Newcastle are in for a summer of massive change as their scouts get to work on uncovering the newest talent in Europe for both the development squad and the first-team. In truth, the club needed this overhaul badly. The only player in recent memory to make a successful jump from the academy to the first-team is Paul Dummett, and that is quite simply not good enough for a club of this stature. The overhaul also hints that Benitez is planning on staying at the club for the long-haul, as it looks like he has been the one who has led these changes.