“Football is an escape, right? It’s entertainment. Football should be fun and players should be fun for people to watch as well. The core thing is bringing joy to people via my work and making people happy through watching good football and good players play.“
You get the feeling that the more involvement Jakub Szewcyzk inevitably has within football, the better it will be for it. We’re talking about an individual who perfectly mixes openness and infectious enthusiasm alongside an ability to critically think in an objective and strategic manner. Given Jakub’s intelligence stems far further than just football, a career within sport didn’t always look the most obvious route.
“Initially it was law I wanted to go into, but I got a B in one of my subjects instead of an A so I decided to take the option of studying language instead. It was something I’d always been good at and knew languages were something that were a good base to build anything off so I could study that and then reevaluate later. The rough plan though was to do a language degree then a post-grad in law and then go into something like international relations or diplomacy.”
Moving to Scotland as a four-year-old from the west of Poland, given Scotland’s relationship with football it wasn’t long into Jakub’s life before he was also seduced by the round ball, admitting however that his ability with it at his feet was somewhat lacking.
“Football has been something I’ve been extremely passionate about since I was quite young, maybe 7 or 8. My family is not a massive footballing family though so it’s not something I grew up with in the living room all the time. Obviously football in Scotland, especially within working-class communities, is absolutely massive. You can’t really escape it as a young guy. I can’t emphasise enough though, I was shocking at playing football and will happily admit to it. I was obviously never good enough to be a footballer and didn’t think there were many other options. Not many kids know about scouting or recruitment and it may not even interest them at that stage, that was something I became aware of a lot later.”
“My first game live was Scotland v Poland in a Euro 2016 qualifier and that was really special. The energy that football stadiums can provide, especially a packed one, is absolutely immense. That game as well as the 2013 Champions League final between Bayern and Dortmund really stood out for me. I remember sitting watching that at home and thinking the whole spectacle was just unbelievable. It was the pinnacle and I knew I wanted to be a part of it in some way.”
Whilst motivation can be extracted from a multitude of sources, for Jakub he admits that a large source of his drive and energy comes from the potential impact his work can have on communities and people.
“Now I know that if I do my job well, I can bring players to either the Polish national team or Raith Rovers that are going to entertain the fans or make memorable moments and bring happiness to the country of Poland or Raith Rovers fans. That kind of feeling really drives me, it’s an incredible incentive isn’t it? Imagine being the guy who brought a player to a club and every time they do a trick or skin somebody you are sitting there feeling massively proud that you are the guy who identified him. That buzz around the stadium when that happens, playing a small part in that joy makes it all worthwhile.”
Much like the man himself, Jakub’s journey into scouting is an interesting one, seeing him go from building a love for Football Manager during lockdown to writing scout reports online about Chilean-based players to working with the Polish FA at only 20 years old.
“It was a massive bit of luck really (getting the job with the Polish FA.) Within football, people rarely get jobs that are posted on some job board so I was talking to someone who turned out to be a scout for the Polish FA and he mentioned they were looking for scouts in Scotland. I had a chat with the boss and after a couple of months, I managed to get the job.
“I’ve learnt so much I would have to be here for about a year talking to you and only touching lightly upon the stuff I’ve learnt. One of the key things is how to manage organisational politics and how to get your point across in an eloquent and proper way. That was important and will help me in my career.
“Also, as someone who didn’t play football professionally, I did not appreciate the mental part of football before I started this role. I’ll be honest and say if you read my scout reports from when I started writing for Target Scouting in 2022 I would write really well about the technical side of play and the physical, but I would not write enough about the mental side because I didn’t find it overly important. I thought if a player controls the ball well, does X, Y and Z well then surely they’ll be okay to make the next step up? I was so wrong, unbelievably wrong. To be a footballer you need to make incredible sacrifices. You’re basically the best of the best, but to get there you need to work extraordinarily hard and be far more intelligent than people give footballers credit for. Modern tactical systems require intelligence and the fact that the players get so much information from dieticians, psychologists, conditioning coaches, which is great, but it’s a lot of information to take on board and then action it.”
So what are some of the psychological factors Jakub analyses when scouting a player?
- Reactions to setbacks
“Setbacks are bound to happen and happen to everyone, whether you’re Messi or some kid in the park, you’ll come across them. To scouts it doesn’t matter how you lose the ball it’s what happens after it that is the crucial piece of data. The difference between a player with an elite mindset is they brush things off so much quicker than others. If they’ve misplaced a pass they will track back, attempt to win the ball back and, importantly, not dwell on a mistake for too long. If they do then they are key moments in a football match where a player is practically missing in action. Some players don’t react well to setbacks or mistakes and that is something I make a point of looking out for. It is worrying when I see a player wallow in it for five minutes, ten minutes or the rest of the match because it varies.”
2. Boldness and bravery
“Other scouts might not rate this as highly but because of the way I see football and the fact it should be entertaining, free-flowing and attacking, players need to, whilst respecting the system, take responsibility and show bravery on the ball. It’s important to me to see whether they can take the ball, pass it forward and have the confidence to try and attempt sometimes difficult passes. So a bit of creativity, a bit of boldness and not being afraid to try things out.”
3. Social interactions and communication
“Communication and body language are really important too. If one player has really bad body language then it can easily spill out to the rest of the team. Also, if their communication is bad then that can also break down a team’s structures throughout the game. Because of how complex the team structures are in modern football, everyone needs to play their part and at times communicate instructions effectively to teammates or coaches.
“Whenever I watch a player I always get to the game early so you can watch the player train before and you can watch the player interact with teammates in a slightly less pressurised environment. I’ll always stay until the end, even if they get taken off at half-time because I want to see how they celebrate or concede goals and react and integrate with teammates. Everything is data, that’s how I see scouting!”
Having not long returned home from his non-footballing work before this interview, you get a feeling that the next step for Jakub now is full-time work within football. Jakub however is currently content with the way his career is progressing and is loving life helping unearth Polish talent within Scotland and recruitment with Raith Rovers in the Scottish Championship.
“I’ve still got the same plan I’ve had for a long time now. I’m really fortunate to have these opportunities working for a club like Raith Rovers and with the Polish FA. I would like to take the next step and make this my full-time job fairly soon. I’ve got another full-time job not related to football at all and an MBA so it’s a lot of work. I’d love to work in a senior position one day. I’m a big fan of strategy and coming up with recruitment plans that span many years and have a big impact. The dream is still to be a Director of Football.”
Quick-fire Questions
Describe yourself in three words: Ambitious, enthusiastic and driven.
How would your family and friends describe you in three words? The words that come to mind are “a bit weird”. This sounds like a strange choice, but whenever I tell anyone who doesn’t work or want to work in football recruitment that I spend most of my free time video scouting, travelling to matches, live scouting and writing scout reports and networking; they think that it’s utterly insane. Especially when I tell them that I don’t get any money for it yet. It’s fairly standard in the world of football recruitment, but crazy to anyone else.
Are you more introverted or extroverted? Given the fact that I’ve rambled on for so long that we’ve had to start a second Zoom call, it’s quite evident that I’m more extroverted. I love people, meeting new people and spending time with people. There are few things that I enjoy more than a long chat with someone interesting and intelligent. However, I do feel like I have a finite social battery so I can’t socialise 24/7. I do need some time to recharge at some point but I do love spending time with people. It’s about finding that balance for me.
Biggest personality strength? I’ll go with my enthusiasm. It makes me a fun and pleasant person to work with. If I’m leading a team, I know that I can motivate them and keep up morale. As a scout, it is a huge strength because I can wax lyrical about a player whom I wholeheartedly believe we should sign and my communication skills are enormously useful in getting my message across to my bosses.
Biggest personality weakness? I feel like I’m probably affected too much by the highs and lows. So in the scouting and recruitment process, there are many ups and downs. At the end of the day even if the scout does all they can and does everything right, things can still go wrong. On the other hand, the buzz of finally signing a player who you’ve been tracking for a long time is the best feeling in the world. I have been working on getting better at managing the highs and lows and I am less affected than I used to be but there is still work to be done for sure.
What is your death row meal?
Drink: I went to Lyon a few years ago and in an amazing Italian restaurant there, I had this blood orange juice which was something like a thicker still San Pellegrino, a bit like those Innocent juices. That was incredible.
Main: I could go with a lovely wood-fired Neapolitan pizza, but I’ll choose something more niche. So there’s this Sri Lankan dish called a Hopper. It’s like an egg crepe with a poached egg on top and it’s filled with chicken (or pork) onions, chillies and tonnes of other herbs and spices and it is absolutely delicious.
Dessert: There are so many wonderful cakes I could choose but I think I’d be happy with some Italian gelato. You can’t beat it.
Book recommendation?
There are so many good football books that I could recommend, but there is one that I think does an incredible job of combining all of them into one exhilarating reading experience: Daniel Fieldsend’s “The European Game”. It just ticks so many boxes for me, travel, football, recruitment, coaching insights, innovation, history and culture. It has absolutely everything and if you haven’t read it you should order it immediately. I can guarantee you won’t regret it.
Best piece of advice you’ve ever been given?
Back when I first started my journey, someone who has been instrumental in my career so far gave me a fantastic piece of advice: “Fake it until you make it.” This advice was specifically to help me with my feeling of imposter syndrome and it was very effective. Don’t get me wrong, every so often I still feel like I am way in over my head but it’s rare and manageable these days. In addition to that though, I have taken that advice and used it in another context. So since then, I have tried to be as professional as possible. Even though I was not a professional scout at the time, I set up my LinkedIn and Twitter in a way that if I were working for a club already, it would be appropriate. So less Chelsea fan chat and no “football Twitter” nonsense. I started using a photo of myself as my profile picture and have kept everything professional. I started networking professionally and began building my personal brand so that I could make the most of my niche Chilean football knowledge. The key thing is and was to behave and act like a professional scout before I became one so that I looked ready for opportunities and so that the transition from football fan to professional scout was mostly done before I got a job in football because the difference is massive.
