The first guest in our new segment is none other than Hernâni Ribeiro.
Ainda desconhecido para muitos, mas que certamente irão ouvir falar futuramente. Foi em tempos um elemento preponderante da equipa de Pesquisa Portuguesa do jogo e é actualmente um dos sócios do ForaDeJogo, mas ganhou mais notoriedade como criador do algoritmo da GoalPoint'salgorithm, which rates players from 1 to 10 in true Football Manager style.
POP: Do you remember which was the first edition you played, and which star player you never skipped buying in every saves?
Hernâni: My earliest memories are still of the old CM. My cousin had CM Italy, and I remember going to his house just to watch him play, fascinated by the chance to find out where some star players I knew from our league had ended up, since I'd lost track of them (yes, in 1993 I had no internet, and the internet itself didn't 'know' as much as it does now). From then on I was hooked, and as soon as I got my first computer (in 1996) I bought that year's CM.
Unlike most people, I tried not to always buy the same players, but I remember very well Sergen Yalçin giving me a lot of joy.
POP: Did you spend a lot of hours playing? Didn't your parents tell you off for it? Didn't it affect your studies?
Hernâni: A lot, really. I remember pulling all-nighters in secret, and that didn't always go down well around exam time. The game's CD 'disappeared' a few times…
POP: Do you have the patience to set up training, coaching coaching, setting the scouting for the team, or did you always just rush through it?
Hernâni: I was always very detail-oriented. The coaching was one of the first things I'd overhaul when arriving at a new club, because in the long run it mattered a lot for player development and for finding wonderkids.
POP: Do you consider yourself an Ace at tactics in FM? Have you managed to win everything?
Hernâni: Even if I thought so, I wouldn't say it, that would be a lack of humility. I liked studying opponents and trying to limit their strengths, a philosophy that still holds true outside the game, and I put in some work on set pieces once that feature started becoming more developed.
As for achievements, off the top of my head I remember winning an Asian Cup with Indonesia, which is quite a feat. I'll mention that one, since you'll reach your hundredth interview without anyone ever having tried anything like it.
POP: Do you prefer saves with top teams, or starting in the lower divisions, and why?
Hernâni: Lower league forever. I'd even rather start unemployed and wait for offers from the weaker clubs. I think the only time I started a save in a top division was in Wales.
POP: What was your longest-running save and how long were you stuck in the same lower division without managing to get promoted?
Hernâni: I'd say the longest was 15-20 seasons, and getting stuck in the same division happened often. In my last save it took me six seasons to get out of the CNS with Amora. I call it sustainable growth, some might call it a lack of skill.
POP: How many years passed between your first time playing and joining the research team, and how did that come about?
Hernâni: I joined the research team in 2009 or 2010, so it's been more than 10 long years now…
POP: Do you still remember what your duties were, and how long you stayed?
Hernâni: I coordinated research for all the non-professional divisions, mostly focused on the 2nd Division B, but also on the main clubs of the now-defunct 3rd National Division.
It was very intense work that I did with real enjoyment for two years, and I'm proud to say it was under me that those divisions really started becoming 'playable', in the sense that squads were always up to date and every player started having at least realistic positions, abilities and potential. Being from Lisbon, I tried to watch as many matches live as possible near where I lived, and I often went to watch matches at the grounds of Atlético, Sintrense, 1º Dezembro, Real, Casa Pia, Oriental, and also a few on the south bank like Sesimbra, Pescadores or Fabril.
POP: You're one of the partners at ForaDeJogo.net. I imagine having the biggest database of domestic competitions at your disposal helped a lot with that role, or did you also get information within the research team that helped ForaDeJogo?
Hernâni: It ForaDeJogo was an essential tool for my work on the game. In fact, I ended up becoming an administrator on the site mostly because I kept filling up its inbox with corrections/suggestions/questions, and they ran out of patience putting up with me and invited me to help manage the database. From then on I worked for both 'causes' in parallel, since they were mutually useful to each other.
POP: Meanwhile, you moved into a new project, GoalPoint's and using statistics to 'discover' talents that the naked eye missed. It GoalPoint's still divides opinion a lot because of rating players based on statistics. The old guard completely dismisses the use of numbers, just as the Football Manager database also continues to be undervalued, despite both platforms already having plenty of cases of players flagged for stardom before becoming real-life success stories. What do you have to say about that?
Hernâni: I understand the scepticism up to a point, because I used to have it myself. However, numbers, if used well, can and should be an essential tool at any professional club that wants to keep improving. The already long list of players I identified through statistics who went on to become certainties in real life just shows the method is valid, perhaps the most valid of all when combined with other kinds of scouting. Just like in scouting traditional scouting, there are good and bad professionals who make more or fewer mistakes, but even that's a reason to use statistics as an extra layer when assessing a player. Besides reducing errors in players already flagged, it saves time identifying other targets, which makes visual scouting much sharper and more focused on what's still left to understand about the player.
POP: Do you think both could complement each other, as well as being an excellent starting point for clubs to later assess a player's real ability through in-person?
Hernâni: I have no doubt at all that both methods complement each other. Nowadays GoalPointPro works with several clubs and professional agents in Portugal, and that's the philosophy we follow. We're just one more layer of information added to whatever those who seek us out already have, and more information always means better decisions, in football and in everything in life.
POP: As a former researcher of Football Managerfor ratings?
Hernâni: As a natural curious mind, I always make a habit of checking the game's database, again, as one more layer of information that can confirm, or not, my own analysis.
POP: You'd been in the game's database for two years without a club, but now you'll appear at Sporting de Braga. Are you hoping for an upgrade to your attributes in the new edition of the game?
Hernâni: The partnership with Braga has been the most visible one lately, but in practice, GoalPointPro and I work with more than one club in Portugal. Since FM doesn't let me 'play' for several at once, you can leave me there in this version (especially if it comes with decent attributes), but the contract has to be part-time. 😀
POP: Any feature you'd like to see added to the game?
Hernâni: In recent years I've had less and less time to play, but from what I've seen the game keeps getting more complete, and it's harder and harder to suggest anything innovative. That said, as a numbers guy, let me say the algorithm that gives players their match ratings could be improved quite a bit, at least based on the last versions I played. ratings, let me say that the algorithm that gives players their match ratings could be improved a lot, at least based on the latest versions I've played.
POP: Do you have any funny story related to CM/FM?
Hernâni: The most interesting thing is really seeing the impact the game had on the direction of my professional life. I think a big part of who I am today comes down to all those hours spent playing as a 'kid'. Every fan of the series dreams of getting to 'play Football Manager in real life', and without ever consciously setting that as a goal, things evolved in a way where part of what I do today actually mirrors what I used to do as a virtualmanager '. It's not a very funny story, but it might be inspiring for some readers.
First edition you played?
CM 97/98.
Favourite edition?
FM 2011.
Favourite team in the game?
Havant & Waterlooville.
Favourite player in the game?
Rolando Zárate, Kim Källström, Julius Aghahowa.
Most overrated player from the last edition you played?
Maybe Sterling, but I might be mixing him up with real life.
Most underrated player?
Ricardo Pereira.
