Brentford

Rasmus Ankersen: 'Balance important to Brentford'

By Pascal Lemesre, Football League Editor | 04 June 2015

Brentford co-director of football Rasmus Ankersen believes that the Bees must find the "right balance" between statistical analysis and coach's intuition this season.

New Brentford co-director of football Rasmus Ankersen has stressed the importance of balancing the club's new reliance on statistics with more traditional coaching methods.

The Bees are taking a revolutionary approach to football with their 'moneyball' use of statistical analysis to both recruit players and make in-match decisions.

Ankersen, from Denmark, revealed at a press conference today that statistics would play a big role for Brentford going forward, including in-game texts to new head coach Marinus Dijkhuizen advising him on what objectives should be set out for the second half.

Ankersen said that identifying hard-to-find "inefficiencies" was a big part of the club's new approach.

"For us, it's not just about statistics, but what you do with the statistics," Ankersen told reporters.

"We think it's important that you have objective analysis as well as a coach's intuition. When we talk about statistics, it's often been misunderstood. We just think there has to be the right balance."

Brentford finished fifth in the Championship last season under Mark Warburton, who left the club after their playoff semi-final defeat to Middlesbrough as he didn't agree with the direction that owner Matthew Benham wanted to take.