Notts County have announced the appointment of Martin Paterson as the club’s new Head Coach via the official club website.
The 38-year-old will be assisted by Andy Edwards and former Magpies goalkeeper Sam Slocombe. They will combine with Director of Football Roberto Gagliardi, owners Chris and Alex Reedtz and Director of Performance Dr David Rhodes to form a “Technical Board” which will oversee the running of the club.
Who Is Martin Paterson?
Paterson enjoyed a long and successful career in English football with the likes of Burnley, Stoke City and Huddersfield Town before hanging up his boots after a short spell in India with Atlético de Kolkata.
He began his coaching career with one of his former clubs, Tampa Bay Rowdies, in the USL Championship.
The former Northern Ireland international then moved to Fort Lauderdale CF in February 2020. The club merged with Inter Miami at the start of 2022 to create Inter Miami II, but Paterson was hired as an assistant coach for the main team.
Paterson returned to England in late 2022, working alongside Michael Duff at Barnsley and Swansea City before getting his first managerial role with Burton Albion in January 2024.
He won five of his 20 games in charge of the Brewers as they narrowly avoided relegation on the final day of the season.
An Interesting Change To The Managerial Structure
As previously mentioned, Paterson will combine with six senior members of staff to form a “Technical Board” which will use the bespoke data model that the Reedtz brothers have created for Notts County to help make decisions.
The club statement says:
“Edwards and Slocombe will join Paterson, our owners, Gagliardi and Director of Performance Dr David Rhodes on a newly-formed Technical Board which will meet regularly to discuss football strategy, team and player performance, data insights and other matters.”
The Technical board will meet before and after each game to work on things like team selection, opposition analysis and a “data-led review of the match” whilst, in the long run, they aim to come up with a method to help the managerial team make more effective in-game decisions.
Speaking on the formation of the new board, the Reedtz brothers said:
“Over the past six years we have been gradually implementing our model at the club, a process which naturally takes time, and we’ve seen good progress on the pitch as well as positive steps towards financial sustainability.
“However we believe that, in order to make further progress towards our ambitious goals, now is the time to make an even stronger commitment to our model – hence our desire to create a structured framework which enables specialist individuals to give their own perspective on various aspects of the club’s football strategy, while also ensuring that the rationale behind important decisions are fully understood by everyone.”
Writer’s View
Notts County are taking a surprisingly big risk given that they finished inside the playoff positions last season.
Their new technical board is unlike anything that has ever been seen in English football and it looks to be taking the data-driven approach that has yielded success for the likes of Brentford to an even more extreme level.
The appointment of Paterson, a coach who has a fairly underwhelming CV for a team that wants to be challenging for promotion, makes more sense within the context of this board. It would be a big risk for an established manager, such as former Magpies boss Luke Williams, to work in an untested environment whereas a less established coach, like Paterson, has much more to potentially gain than lose.
