OptaPro is delighted to announce that Miguel Rios has joined as its Football Intelligence Manager.
Miguel brings a wealth experience to OptaPro, having held positions at Wolves, Fulham, Brentford, Arsenal and FC Barcelona.
Miguel will lead OptaPro’s new football intelligence team which will focus on delivering bespoke analytical projects directly to clubs and governing bodies across Europe.
Alongside this, Miguel’s 16 years of experience within football will allow him to work closely with the data science team, ensuring that OptaPro’s analytical outputs are applicable and relevant to professional teams’ scouting and performance analysis processes.
Miguel’s most recent role was at Premier League side Wolves as a European scout, which combined live, video and data-driven scouting approaches. Ahead of joining Wolves in 2017, Miguel was a senior scout at Fulham. Miguel’s experience has seen him work directly with head coaches, directors of football and heads of recruitment, gaining extensive relationships at a global level across the game.
Miguel has also held academy and foundation recruitment roles at Brentford, Arsenal and FC Barcelona, which began in 2003 after a successful career in the financial sector in the City.
Discussing his role, Miguel said:
“Joining OptaPro is a fantastic opportunity. Having worked within academy football to the professional level across both coaching and scouting has given me excellent exposure to the different philosophies and workflows within clubs across Europe at all levels.
“This will allow me to assist in maximising and leveraging the power of Opta data and analytics to further develop the coaching, scouting and talent identification processes at football clubs worldwide.”