'Truly remarkable': Recruitment analyst who worked with Eddie Howe at Bournemouth says NUFC boss is very involved in recruitment

Cast your minds back to last summer when Paul Mitchell arrived at Newcastle United, and suddenly, the media was awash with reports of a clash between him and manager Eddie Howe.

For weeks the saga played out in the media with no real evidence of a rift. The alleged problem being that Eddie Howe wanted more control over transfers than Paul Mitchell was willing to offer.

Well, as it turns out, there may have been a hint of truth to those rumours if what former Bournemouth recruitment analyst Thomas Spring has had to say.

Speaking on The Overlap Breakdown podcast, Spring recalls how involved Eddie Howe was in recruitment during his time at Bournemouth.

Eddie Howe was heavily involved in recruitment at Bournemouth

Now head of scouting at Saudi Pro League side Al-Ettifaq, Spring says he was impressed by the level of detail Eddie Howe would go into when looking to bring in new players.

“I would say the process that we had was extremely detailed and a lot of skilled people were involved in the player decision process.

“From Richard Hughes, to Des Taylor, Andy Howe, Eddie Howe. He [Eddie Howe] probably did more work than a scout on a player. He was truly remarkable in the work he did on players.

“He would go to games live to scout a player. I think most managers are like that because they are the ones investing time into that player.

“They’re going to be with them on the training pitch every day; they’re the ones that are going to be investing their time, effort and skillset into that player, so they go to these games, watch these players and assess them thoroughly to ensure that they can work with them and they can be a success.”

Eddie Howe's eye for detail can surely only be a positive for Paul Mitchell

The rumours from the summer were certainly blown way out of proportion by the media, although there was some friction as both Howe and Mitchell got used to each other's way of working.

It only makes sense that the manager, who has to work with the players every day, has some input into the recruitment process. The idea that Paul Mitchell was trying to shut out Howe is ridiculous.

Now, given what Spring has said about Eddie Howe's attention to detail, we imagine that the two are working very well together, although we doubt he has the time to scout many players personally these days.