The
sacking of Steven Morrow and several of his staff was the first sign of Edu, Arsenal’s
technical director, examining the structures at the club and acting with real authority.
Relations had not been ideal between Morrow and Per Mertesacker, head of the academy.
In an ideal world, the decision makers responsible for scouting, recruitment and player development
would share a healthy rapport with the best interests at the club in mind, but the disharmony
has been problematic.
One of Edu’s first observations when he returned to Arsenal in the summer of 2019
was to notice the sheer number of staff across various departments. The club have been explicit
in promoting youth development as a key part of their operation. So if this was a case
of too many cooks spoiling the broth, it was time to simplify the menu.
Morrow had, of course, been a midfielder at the club a generation before Edu, a member
of a mid-1990s team that won silverware a decade before Arsenal’s Invincibles. At
the end of his playing career he moved to the United States and spent time in Dallas
as a player and coach. It was there he came across one of the highest executives in Major
League Soccer, a certain Ivan Gazidis.
When Morrow first rejoined Arsenal — a few months before Gazidis arrived as chief executive
— his job initially was to supervise their international partnerships. Arsenal had links
with various clubs overseas, including Stan Kroenke’s Colorado Rapids. There was also
an attempt to run an academy in Greece which could be a stop-off point for young talent
from outside the EU en route to Arsenal. That operation closed without any notable success.
It was Gazidis who promoted Morrow, though, creating a role that had not previously existed
at the club: head of youth scouting. Up until then, any young players brought into the club
either came through the head of the academy or the chief scout. The new role of a head
of youth scouting added a further layer of confusion; who ultimately made the final call
and who held responsibility for which decisions?
Morrow had strongly-fuelled ambition from the moment he returned to Arsenal to work
behind the scenes. In the 11 years he was at the club in his post-playing career, he
was happy for his hat to be in the ring when important positions came up. When the post
of head of the academy was available in 2014, he was keen to be considered. The Dutchman
Andries Jonker got the job, resulting in an almost instant personality clash with Morrow.
The two men did not see eye-to-eye.
More recently, Morrow was keen on the technical director job that eventually went to Edu.
Morrow had come through Arsenal’s youth system when it was a very different beast,
when boys on the YTS scheme had to clean first-team players’ boots and do menial jobs around
their then stadium Highbury and the training ground. It was an era where everyone knew
everyone and the staff was small enough to encourage that atmosphere.
Looking at Arsenal’s first team today the influence of the academy is obvious, with
Joe Willock and Bukayo Saka playing regularly, Reiss Nelson and Emile Smith Rowe hopeful
of more game time in the Europa League this week, and Eddie Nketiah scoring goals on loan
at Leeds United. All of them came through the Hale End production line since boyhood.
This is the level of player the club is eager to generate. All of them were spotted when
they were very young, in the era when Liam Brady oversaw the academy. He made his own
decisions without having to negotiate with a separate youth scouting department.
So Arsenal have ditched the model invented by Gazidis — with a specific head of scouting
for the academy — and this decision allows them to streamline the process of making progress
with their youngsters.
It is now down to Mertesacker to oversee how he best wants to ensure the standard of young
player invited to the club. Although results are far from the only measure of the work
of an academy — especially as Mertesacker is very focused on looking after the young
personalities and trying to help them cope with pressure — it has not gone unnoticed
that results have dipped recently in certain age groups and something needed to change.
Morrow’s time was up and if there is a decision to be made in future with regard to personnel,
Edu has shown himself unafraid to make it.