Brentford Moneyball Strategy

Brentford FC are a club based in West London that got promoted to the Premier League last season for the first time in 74 years. The Bees have had a great start to the season so far as they have an exciting young squad. Much of Brentford's success on and off the pitch was based off a similar strategy of the film Moneyball where the club decided to buy players based off analysis and performance indicators. Although this strategy took time to work out on the pitch, the results were worth it as Brentford were promoted to the Premier League last season for the first time since 1945.  

Brentford players huddle up before facing Man United
Image Source: Brentford FC official website

Despite taking the Bees a couple of seasons of being one step too short of getting promoted to the Premier League, their financial results were a success. The club's profit for player sales was the third highest in the championship in the 2019/20 season with a 25 million pound profit, and only being below Swansea and Bristol City. The West London side profited from player sales even more than the likes of Leeds United who were promoted to the Premier League that season. Much of Brentford’s profit from player sales came from the sales of Neal Maupay to Brighton and Ezri Konsa to Aston Villa. Despite the Bees player sales profit in the 2019/20 season being 2 million pounds short of the previous season the profits are still nearly twice as high as the club’s 14 million revenue.

Data Source: Transfermarkt

There has been quite a few players Brentford had signed that were undervalued and were sold for record transfer fees such as Algerian international Said Benrahma and Ollie Watkins to name a few. Ollie Watkins signed for the Bees from League Two side Exeter City for 6.50 million pounds in 2017. Despite it being a big step for Watkins going from League Two straight to the Championship, he impressed at Brentford having scored 49 goals in 132 matches. Watkins then signed for Aston Villa in 2020 for about 30 million pounds which is the current transfer record for Brentford.

The Bees signed Said Benrahma from OGC Nice for 1.53 million pounds in 2018 despite him struggling to find his form for the Ligue 1 side and going on loan multiple times in his five years at the South French side. The scouting team in Brentford made the right signing as Benrahma became a fan favorite having scored 27 goals and 23 assists in 86 matches for the club in the Championship. In 2020, West Ham signed Benrahma on a loan deal for 3.96 million pounds for a year. He ended up being a key player for the Hammers and the East London side signed Benrahma on a permanent deal in 2021 for 20.79 million pounds.

Although French forward Neal Maupay played more Ligue 1 matches than his former teammate Benrahma, he struggled to find the back of the net having only scored seven goals in 59 appearances in the French topflight. However, in the season before Brentford signed Maupay he went down a division to Ligue 2 side Brest and got 11 goals in 28 matches. As the Frenchman signed for the Bees in 2017 for 1.80 million pounds, the scouting team made yet another brilliant move as Maupay scored 37 goals, 12 assists in 85 matches in his two seasons competing in the Championship. Maupay then went on to sign for Premier League side Brighton in 2019 for 20 million pounds.

Data Source: Joe Pompliano (Writer for Huddle Up newsletter)

Despite the Bees being very successful with player sales their revenue was the third lowest in the Championship with roughly 14 million pounds in the 2019/20 season with only Preston North End and Wigan Athletic below them. Brentford CEO Jon Varney complained that with seven teams in the Championship having Premier League parachute payments is making it much more difficult to compete in the league. A PL parachute payment is a payment from the Premier League to teams that got relegated to the Championship for the first three years with the amount decreasing every year. Even if there wasn't a parachute payment, the Bees would still be way below the leading clubs such as Leeds United with 40 million pounds below them.

Data Source: Transfermarkt

Even though Brentford had less revenue than most Championship teams, their revenue kept growing every season and their performances on the pitch were one of the best in the Championship ultimately leading them to promotion to one of the best leagues in the world which is what really counts in the end.