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On today’s Explainer, we take a look at the rise of Brentford and Barnsley in the Championship, and assess how their use of cutting edge analytics and sound financial planning has seen them become two of the division’s most impressive sides, as they look to get promoted to the Premier League through the play-offs this year.
Moneyball has become a buzzword in football over the last decade. In reference to the book, later made into a film starring Brad Pitt, about Billy Beane’s transformation of the Oakland Athletics in US baseball, it encapsulates the idea that by using cutting edge analysis and identifying undervalued players in the transfer market, clubs with small budgets can take on bigger, wealthier rivals and succeed.
And with promotion to the English Premier League the most lucrative prize in football, worth an estimated £180million to those which achieve it, it’s no surprise that this way of thinking has been adopted by some clubs in the Championship in recent seasons.
Two clubs closely associated with the Moneyball concept, Brentford and Barnsley, have been among the division’s most talked-about sides over the last two seasons, both harbouring ambitions of entry into the world’s most valuable league through a sustainable business model. On today’s FD Explained, we’re going to take a look at how both clubs achieved their current success.
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14 май 2021
