Hey Reader,

Everyone's asking the wrong question about AI in football.

It's not "will my job disappear?"

It's "am I building skills that survive the shift?"

Last week, someone in the Recruitment Room asked whether the technical skills they'd spent years learning would be redundant in 10 years. The question sparked a thread that cut through the AI panic and landed on something more useful: clarity about what actually matters.

Here's the truth.

Jobs won't disappear. But the way we work will change completely.

The boring stuff - logging reports, tagging actions, filtering by basic metrics, creating simple dashboards - will be automated within 2-3 years. If that's your core skillset, you're exposed.

But the human elements? Those stay.

There are so many things that AI can't replace.

Contextual decision-making, understanding club culture fit, evaluating mentality and behaviour, projecting development and risk, knowing how a player interacts with their environment, and judging whether data actually matches reality.

Here are four skills that will enable you to thrive.

1. Communication

This matters more than anything technical you'll learn.

Most clubs aren't as data-driven as they make you believe. The real skill is explaining complex analysis to sporting directors, owners, and coaches who see "just numbers."

As the technical divide grows, your ability to bridge that gap becomes more valuable, not less.

2. Tactical understanding

AI can tag actions. It can't fully understand your club's specific game model. It can't explain why two coaches with similar philosophies are actually completely different. It can't adapt to football's constant evolution.

That requires human judgement.

3. Advanced data literacy

The baseline is rising. Combining football knowledge with data literacy will become standard, not a bonus.

Understanding tracking data and physical metrics - SkillCorner, Second Spectrum, StatsBomb 360 - will separate people who thrive from people who survive. Particularly with spatial data and the upcoming skeleton data revolution.

4. AI workflow integration

There's a difference between using AI effectively and using it desperately.

Effective: automated report templates, player comparison dashboards, alerts that save time.

Desperate: "write me a report" and hoping it works.

People who build systems around AI will replace people who treat it like magic.

The shift in expectations

AI allows scouts and analysts to do more.

The tasks that used to prove you could do the job will be automated. So you'll need to prove something else: that you can interpret, decide, and communicate in ways that machines can't.

All clubs and organisations have access to the same data. What separates them is how clearly you communicate findings and influence decisions within your own context.

What this means for you

If you're building a career in football, stop spending all your time learning tools.

Spend more time developing judgement. More time understanding tactics. More time practising how you explain your work to non-technical people. More time using AI to speed up your workflow, not replace your thinking.

The jobs aren't disappearing. But they're changing faster than most people are adapting.

The question isn't whether AI will take your role. It's whether you're building the skills that matter when the boring tasks vanish.

Liam.