Chapter 77 New Sponsorship, New Model, New Assistant
"Leo and his team gained a lot from their trip to the Middle East."
In the car heading to Majadahonda from Madrid Capital Airport on the ring road, Hill, who came to pick him up in person, seemed particularly excited because the team's current management mechanism reform was going very smoothly.
As Yang Hao said before, professional matters should be left to professionals.
After about a month of reorganization, Atletico Madrid has now basically stabilized, and the responsibilities of each department have gradually become clear.
General Manager Xiao Xier is now much more relaxed than before, so he has time to come and pick up Yang Hao's plane.
"Leo admires you even more now. He described the Middle East as a land of gold. I heard that companies there are very interested in sponsoring European teams. We have also decided to go to Dubai during the winter break this season to play a warm-up match."
This is a plan. The opponents for the warm-up matches have not been arranged yet, but the appearance fee will definitely not be low.
It may be a bit of an exaggeration to say that there is gold everywhere, but now the whole world, whether it is the Middle East, Asia, South America or Africa, basically regards Europe and the United States as paradise.
Yang Hao had personally experienced this kind of process in his previous life, and the Middle East market was still a virgin land to be developed for European teams. If Atletico Madrid was the first to break in, they would definitely be able to get a big piece of fat meat.
So, they signed with Emirates Airlines directly.
"Carlos Leo is indeed very capable." Yang Hao praised.
He just pointed in a direction, but it was amazing that Leo was able to negotiate a sponsorship contract.
"Don't be so modest. Even Leo said that without your guidance, he would never have made it to the Middle East. It hasn't been long since you signed the jersey sponsorship." Little Hill was grinning from ear to ear the whole way.
Yang Hao also found it funny to see this poor man suddenly become rich, "It's only 3 million euros, is it that serious?"
"Of course, you know what? Even Real Madrid can't get sponsorship right now!"
"What do you mean?" Yang Hao felt very strange.
"You've been in Brazil recently, so you haven't heard the news, right? Real Madrid will have an advertisement for their official website on the chest of their jerseys for the new season. Of course, they say to the outside world that they want to promote their official website, but in fact, we all know that it's because Real Madrid failed to get sponsorship." Little Hill felt a bit gloating.
"Really? Wasn't their previous sponsor called Teka? Are they not renewing the contract?"
Teka, a large European company that produces and manufactures kitchen appliances and bathroom appliances, sponsored Real Madrid for two years, with the contract ending in the summer of 2000.
"I don't know, but the contract won't be renewed anyway." Little Hill said happily.
"Some people say that it's because Real Madrid's asking price is too high. Real Madrid itself is now heavily in debt. Having won the Champions League twice in three years, they want to increase the sponsorship fee, but Dege Kitchen Appliances is not happy about it."
"Others say it's because Dege Kitchen Appliances didn't get the return it deserved from its sponsorship of Real Madrid over the past two seasons, especially last season when Real Madrid's performance was so poor that they even finished in the middle of the table, which made Dege Kitchen Appliances very dissatisfied."
Yang Hao was silent. Perhaps both possibilities exist?
"If you ask me, you were right. Real Madrid's current approach is to wait for sponsors to come to them and offer money. If no sponsors come, they won't go out and look for them. They will just use their own official website to put it up."
In comparison, Atletico Madrid's current approach is much more pragmatic, and they are actively looking for money outside.
Look, Atletico Madrid has chest advertisements, while Real Madrid can only run naked.
When he thought of this, Xiao Xi'er admired Yang Hao even more.
"I heard from Leo and the others that this partnership with Emirates is just a trial. If our team's performance improves, they will continue to increase their sponsorship. So, we must show better performance on the pitch and strive to achieve better results."
Little Hill has now tasted the sweetness and is starting to want more.
This is not a bad thing. After all, everyone should be enterprising.
"Don't worry, there's no problem on my side." Yang Hao is very confident about the lineup for the new season.
However, the team made a lot of profit from transfer fees. Hasselbaink earned 30 million euros, and they also received 35 million euros from Deportivo La Coruña. Next, they will sell players such as Panovic, Fernando Correa and Marcos Marquez.
All in all, Atletico Madrid is expected to make a profit of 30 million euros from the transfer market this summer.
Of course, this has also led to the outside world being pessimistic and even desperate about Atletico Madrid's prospects for the new season.
After selling the players, the players Atletico Madrid brought in are obviously not as famous as before.
You know, those who were signed before were the likes of Hasselbaink, Belleron, and Capdevila. They were either excellent foreign players or local stars. Which one of them was not a well-known player?
But what about now?
Who is Gravesen?
Even the rumored Van der Sar, how has he performed in Serie A?
Has Atletico Madrid now fallen to the point of picking up the scraps of wealthy clubs?
But Yang Hao still emphasized to Xiao Xi'er that the plan previously deployed must be implemented.
For example, the plan to negotiate cooperation with the Medical School of the University of Madrid to establish a laboratory and improve Atletico Madrid's medical standards is of paramount importance and is related to the health and injury prevention of Atletico Madrid players, and must not be taken lightly.
There is also the establishment of a scouting system and the reorganization of the youth training system, which are all crucial.
Yang Hao and Juanma Lillo have drawn up a detailed youth training restructuring plan, including how Atletico Madrid's youth training will operate in the future. There are preliminary plans for these.
For example, Yang Hao wants to reorganize the second team and sell those players over the age of 23, focusing on young players under the age of 23. This further clarifies the significance of Atletico Madrid's second team.
It is not used to achieve good results, but to cultivate talents for the first team.
It's not just the second team, the youth training team is also like this.
Yang Hao personally clarified the future tactical style for Atletico Madrid, which is to focus on fast-paced pressing and oppression, and insist on passing and cutting.
This is consistent with the style of the first team and is also in line with the future development trend of football.
Especially the passing and cutting coordination, which requires strengthening passing, ball control and off-ball running. It is very important to cultivate the players' skills and awareness, but it will never be as extreme as Barcelona's pure ball control.
Yang Hao will appoint Juanma Lillo to serve as Atletico Madrid's youth training consultant, responsible for coordinating the technical and tactical styles of all age groups, so as to achieve a unified style from the first team to the second team to youth teams at all levels.
But this was not enough. Yang Hao proposed a model that was widely used by many clubs 20 years later: large-scale joint training.
What does it mean?
For example, Atletico Madrid’s Majadahonda only has a few fields, but there are so many youth teams. How do they train on a daily basis?
Divided into time periods.
That is to say, on the same football field, players of different age groups are divided into different time periods for training.
Maybe when the U19 was training, the U17 was warming up on the sidelines, and the U15 had already finished training and left.
This will inevitably bring some barriers, and different coaches will lead different team styles, which will cause a problem.
For a U15 player to be promoted to U17 is like joining a new team and he needs to adapt again.
But the large-scale joint training proposed by Yang Hao was different.
First of all, when selecting coaches for each age group, they will pay attention to the similarity of technical and tactical styles and concepts .
When they were coaching, the youth training consultant was responsible for coordinating the training programs and controlling the training style. Juanma Lillo was Yang Hao's hand in controlling youth training.
The purpose of this is to make the training content and environment received by the players as close as possible.
Every once in a while, tentatively once a month, teams of similar age groups will be separated and put together for training and internal competitions, and the coaches of each echelon will also be reassigned.
The advantage of doing this is that both coaches and players can get to know each other, and it also facilitates the team's internal selection.
Players trained in this environment, from U7 to U19, are actually the same. The coaches are familiar with the players, and the players are familiar with the coaches and teammates around them. Basically, they can achieve seamless connection, which will be a great convenience for training players.
In Yang Hao's previous life, in 2023 , clubs large and small in Spain and even Europe basically adopted this large-scale joint training model, which in itself proves its advanced nature.
When Yang Hao first proposed this idea, Juanma Lillo was amazed and even couldn't wait to try out its feasibility and effectiveness.
If successful, this will likely be a paradigm shift.
…
After Yang Hao returned to Mahadahonda, he began to have busy work.
First, Juanma Lillo reported on the latest progress of youth training reform, especially the screening and recruitment of some coaches, which are crucial links.
Since Hill agreed to invest in youth training, Yang Hao naturally wanted him to see the results and returns.
Afterwards, Yang Hao also met his two new assistants, both of whom were physical trainers selected by him personally.
A Catalan named Albert Roca played for Atletico Madrid for two years during his career. After retiring in 1992, he studied sports teaching and sports science at the University of Barcelona NFFC, and later studied sports psychology at the University of Madrid.
His previous coaching record was not very good. He worked as a fitness coach or coached independently in lower-level leagues. This time he was attracted by Atletico Madrid's recruitment.
Yang Hao chose him because Albert Roca was the physical trainer when Rijkaard later coached Barcelona. He also had a strong internet mindset and set up his own personal website early on. He was also good at learning and accepting new things.
The two had had several phone conversations before. Yang Hao hoped that he would be responsible for the collection, statistics and deduction of the players' physical data. If possible, it would be best to make a data model to help the coaching staff understand the players' physical condition.
The other is 42-year-old Oscar Ortega. Fans familiar with Atletico Madrid will not be unfamiliar with him. He is Simeone's assistant coach in the future, but in fact, he helped Aragones coach Atletico Madrid as early as 2001.
He has extensive work experience in countries such as Mexico, Colombia and Japan. He previously served as a fitness coach for the Sevilla rugby team. When he applied for the position of fitness coach for Atletico Madrid this time, he was selected by Yang Hao.
The reason why Yang Hao chose him is very simple. Oscar Ortega's ability is worthy of trust as he can make Aragones and Simeone's team run so well.
Two fitness coaches, goalkeeper coach Pedro Haro, physiotherapist Parales, and Juanma Lillo are Yang Hao's core coaching team for the new season.
There are many other coaches in the first team, such as technical coaches and tactical coaches, etc. Yang Hao is still considering recruiting data analysts, but he is considering cooperating with the University of Madrid in this regard.
