Nobody knows exactly what is going on at United, but there is speculation that the scouting system is in need of a serious rework. Everything went through Ferguson. Where other teams had in depth databases full of player stats, United had scout reports sent to the manager. Not a bad thing when he was in charge because it was a system which was good for him. But one which needs modernising.
We have good scouts. They've spotted and recommended a lot of players over the years, but our system apparently relies too much on the word of one man, who can obviously get things wrong from time to time. Which is why you hear stories of a United scout saying Isco wasn't good enough for us. Teams have reams of stats and data on players compiled by multiple scouts. That's what Moyes is apparently trying to introduce at United. Getting multiple scouts
looking at the same player in different games. I think it's an attempt to eliminate the human error in our system. This is all just guesswork, but from different media reports and stuff that's been written, I think it's close to the mark.
My guess is that Moyes is going for the big name players because we need proven quality straight away to boost the team. And maybe because he needs time to rework the scouting system before he feels confident in going for the lesser known, relatively unproven players.
