Before you ask
The questions I'd ask too
Recruitment work
Have you worked inside a club?
No. Which is why I publish the method instead of asserting the experience.
The recruitment work is entirely my own: six seasons of publicly available event data turned
into corridor models, role clustering, custom metrics, complete mock commissions — and a
public audit of my own transfer calls a season on, misses included. All of it at The Cutback,
with the method open.
What my client work gives me is production discipline: visual and editorial output delivered
on deadline, at scale, for audiences that notice mistakes. The two streams don't share data.
They share standards.
You can judge the quality of both before paying for a minute of it. Very few people you could
hire will offer you that.
Whose data do we use?
Yours. Clubs and agencies already licence a feed that covers the players they'd realistically
sign, and I work inside it. Published work on The Cutback runs on publicly available data —
which means a paid project has deeper coverage than anything you can read for free.
What if the data can't answer the question?
Then I say so on the scoping call, before you've spent anything. Event data is very good at
some questions and poor at others — defenders and goalkeepers remain genuinely hard, and I'd
rather tell you that up front than deliver a confident answer built on thin evidence.
Do you take retainers?
After a first project, yes — around €900 a month for ongoing shortlist and analysis support
through a window. Better for both of us to start with something scoped.
Editorial work
Can you work in our house style?
Yes. Send your style guide, fonts and colour palette, or a few published pieces, and graphics
and copy follow them. If you don't have a guide, I'll propose one and keep it consistent.
Who owns the finished work?
Usage rights are agreed in the written scope. By default you get the right to publish the piece
and graphics in the agreed outlets; exclusive or unlimited rights are available and priced in.
Where does the data for published work come from?
From a source we agree before starting, with a credit line if it needs one. Your licence is the
first option; where you don't have one, I work from sources that are explicitly free to publish and
tell you up front what that covers. Nothing gets published on data neither of us has the right to use.
Either way
How fast can you start?
I work as a freelance analyst with existing commitments, so I take a limited number of
projects at a time and quote timelines I can actually hold. If the window is tight, say so
on the call and I'll tell you honestly whether it fits.
Do you work in English?
Yes. Italian native, English professional, written and spoken.
