Who is Paul Mitchell? West Ham’s next transfer guru & director of football

West Ham are expected to appoint a new Director of Football over the next few weeks, casting doubts over the future of Rob Newman.

The club has already made approaches for different names, but one has been mentioned repeatedly.

Monaco’s Paul Mitchell has emerged as a frontrunner to take the reigns of the club’s recruitment. Mitchell is known to have a close friendship with Mark Noble, and the latter has made monthly trips to Monaco. This has further intensified rumours that Mitchell is set to move to East London.

The 41-year-old has developed a proven record of sensible spending and talent identification. He has worked in three different European countries and with young head coaches. Given that his expertise in recruitment has resulted in positive changes for the clubs he has worked for, it is no surprise that he has been linked with moves to Champions League giants.

CAREER

Mitchell’s playing career was marred by injuries which forced him to retire at the age of 28. He became the Head of Recruitment for the MK Dons, leading a newly-formed scouting system. Mitchell worked under manager Karl Robinson, who was the youngest manager in the Football League at the time.

He moved to Southampton in January 2012 and oversaw the club’s promotion to the Premier League. He stayed on when Mauricio Pochettino was appointed manager in January 2013. Under Mitchell’s guidance, Southampton signed many familiar names. Maya Yoshida, Sadio Mané and Virgil van Dijk were some of the players Mitchell signed; Mane and van Dijk later joined for Liverpool for significantly large fees and won a Premier League title.

Mitchell followed Pochettino to Tottenham in 2014. His two most notable signings were Dele Alli (who had previously known Mitchell at the Dons) and Son Heung-min. Alli became known as one of Europe’s brightest young talents to the point where he was linked with a move to Real Madrid. Son has since scored over 100 Premier League goals.

The relationship between Mitchell and Spurs chairman Daniel Levy soured in 2016 to the point where Mitchell resigned. He then moved abroad to work for RB Leipzig, a relatively new football club who placed a special emphasis on using its youth system to develop players within a set program. His first transfer window saw Leipzig sign Emile Smith Rowe on loan from Arsenal, as well as the arrivals of Nordi Mukiele and Matheus Cunha. He also signed Tyler Adams.

Leipzig’s success from its bottom-up approach resulted in Mitchell being rumoured to join Manchester United in 2019. However, he chose to stay in Germany and dismissed the reports. He moved to Monaco in 2020.

At the Ligue 1 club he purchased the likes of Breel Embolo and Axel Disasi, who West Ham are keen on buying. Mitchell is set to leave when his contract expires this summer.

WHAT CAN MITCHELL DO FOR WEST HAM?

Mitchell has grown accustomed to working for teams with strong foundations for their academies. His work with the MK Dons kick-started this interest, as he saw the club as being a forefront in domestic youth development. He may be able to use West Ham’s trait as “The Academy of Football” as a basis to improve the youth teams within the club, emphasizing the need to use more younger players in a professional game.

One other benefit Mitchell can bring to West Ham is his scouting network. He uses scouts across Europe to identify players who are younger, but with a good resale value at a later date. Selling Mane could be used as an example, as the forward left the Saints for three times the price he was bought for.

Mitchell’s relationship with Noble will also be important for the club. Noble, who is now Sporting Director of West Ham, can reinforce the club’s infrastructure and traditions to Mitchell. This will give him a clear idea of how the clubs needs to operate and what style of football the fans will warm to.

With potentially huge money to spend if Declan Rice is sold, the Hammers could see a re-build this summer.