Written by
Training Ground Guru
December 23, 2025
Here are TGG’s top 10 best-read articles of 2025…
10. Why Brentford want ALL their Foundation Phase to play grassroots
For the second year in a row, Brentford Academy and Stephen Torpey make it into our top 10 – this time explaining why the Bees want ALL their 9s to 12s to be playing grassroots sport alongside their club activities. Torpey (pictured) was subsequently appointed Academy Director at Manchester United.
9. Manchester United appoint Sansoni as new Director of Data
Manchester United’s behind-the-scenes rebuild was one of the big themes of 2025. In May, we reported how the club had hired Michael Sansoni from Mercedes F1 to become their new Director of Data. Sansoni had been Mercedes’ Senior Performance Simulation Engineer (Trackside) during eight World Championships.
8. Stuart Webber: Thinking about the Sporting Director of the future
In January, we caught up with Stuart Webber who, for the first time in his career, was having a prolonged break from the game. This had given him time to reflect and refresh and he had been learning Spanish, visiting other sports and learning more about data and AI. In this article, he gave us his views on what the Sporting Director of the future would look like.
7. Hunter-Barrett leaving Wolves to become Rangers Academy Director
In October we reported that Jon Hunter-Barrett was leaving Wolves after 14-and-a-half years to become Academy Director at Rangers. The move would reunite him with Gers Sporting Director Kevin Thelwell. However, little more than a month later it was announced that Hunter-Barrett would be staying at Wolves to take on a beefed-up Academy Director role.
6. Duo leaving Manchester United after combined 30 years’ service
Another story about United’s restructure. This time we reported how Head of Performance Analysis Paul Brand and Director of Insights and Innovation Richard Hawkins were leaving the club after a combined service of almost 30 years. Brand (pictured) had joined from Blackburn Rovers in July 2013, while Hawkins was hired in 2008.
5. Liverpool hire Manchester City Head of Data Shaw
Liverpool pulled off a major coup in April by hiring Laurie Shaw from rivals Manchester City to become their Chief Scientist. Shaw is a new breed of football practitioner: he has a PhD in computational astrophysics, has developed trading systems for a £30bn hedge fund and was also once a policy advisor for the British government. At City he had been Head of AI.
4. ‘Unprofessional and untrue’: External coach hits back at Heckingbottom
When forward Daniel Jebbison missed Preston’s opening-day draw at QPR because of an ankle injury, Manager Paul Heckingbottom pulled no punches. “He has been working with a fella called Tom King… it’s not happening any more,” he said. King was similarly forthright in response, describing Heckingbottom’s comments as “not only unprofessional but also untrue.”
3. Rob Mackenzie: How Tottenham went to stage two of their transfer strategy
Our guest on Episode #73 of the TGG Podcast was Tottenham Head of Scouting Rob Mackenzie. This article was taken from that interview, with Mackenzie explaining how the club had moved to stage two of their transfer strategy, from signing potential to signing proven. “It’s about getting a balance and complementing what you already have,” he said.
2. Chelsea top TGG’s Academy Rankings for third straight year
Our exclusive Academy Productivity Rankings are always one of our most popular pieces of content – and this year was no different. The Rankings – the only publicly available resource of their kind – assess English Academies according to the number of graduates who made at least appearance in the top five English and European leagues. And once again, Chelsea came out on top.
1. Set pieces, long balls and target men: The journey from positionism
Appearing on Episode #74 of the TGG Podcast, football coach and tactics expert Jamie Hamilton charted the journey from positionism, championed by Pep Guardiola, to what we are increasingly seeing now: an increase in long balls, set pieces and target men. Hamilton offered a glimpse of a positive future, with relationism and instinctive talents like Rayan Cherki coming to the fore.
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