Lol we're blaming scouts now...
You realize we have one of the top 3 scouting networks in the world? We have folders on over 300 players and the management ignores most of that because they either don't know the player or even worse, the agent... Sometimes they accept 3rd party opinions if it's from Zanetti or the coach.
The only reason Udinese are praised for is actually signing some of these guys, but it's not like they're on our radar.
Ausilio gets a hard on for 20+ players that most of us ever heard of but he cannot bring any of them. At least this wasn't the case when he brought us Lautaro and Brozovic... Or Karamoh, whom we preferred him over Tchouameni, yet Ausilio was adamant on getting both.
Someone obviously was doing the scouting and someone was doing the evaluation. Last I checked, most of these guys are still around.
I am responding on this thread because it's an interesting discussion so it's better to have it here than on defenders thread.
A part of scout's job is writing such a good report that could convince sporting director to go for the player. Else he isn't doing his job properly. Ausilio being a former scout himself knows how to read scout reports very well and can distinguish when a player is worth taking a closer look. So i am not buying the argument scouts are ignored.
A big part for Lautaro signing goes to Milito who informed Zanetti early he's a great talent and Simeone is trying to sign him but i will give him to our scouts. I will also give them Zaniolo, Dimarco, Gnonto and Bastoni who were brought to Inter early. It's not their fault club fucked up with Zaniolo and Gnonto. I will give them Skriniar even though he was already in Serie A. They also deserve credit for Kovacic if we go even further back. I also remember Inter getting linked with Lobotka and Bergwijn before their big moves. There were probably others throughout the years i don't recall right now or we haven't even heard of.
But let's not only remember their good suggestions. They were probably the same guys who convinced Ausilio to sign Salcedo and Colidio for 20m in a time club didn't even have money for the first team. Salcedo can't even make it in Serie B and Colidio had to return to Argentina to find his level. Thankfully there were Chinese restrictions back then because the initial agreement with Genoa was 30m for Salcedo and Pellegri, another player who has barely done anything at professional level. Also when Mirabelli, Inter head scout, went to Milan he basically signed most of the players from Ausilio's list. We had been linked with all those in the previous years. Well considering how they ended up for Milan we should be grateful we didn't have money back then. When Branca made terrible signings in 2011-13 how many of those were actually scout suggestions?
Ausilio having crushes on players we haven't even heard of shouldn't surprise any of us. It's his job to know the market. These guys watch a lot more football than any of us. Klopp has said recently that if there's a game played in Europe there isn't a Liverpool scout who hasn't watched it. Perhaps an exaggeration but you get how top clubs work as i am sure you already know.
You're right it isn't a scout work to implement primavera players into the first team. That's on primavera coach to develop him and first team coach to notice him and gradually implement him. And this has been an Inter problem historically. When you have money it isn't a big issue. You just go straight to proven players because you can simply afford it and you don't bother developping them. But when you don't have money it's a huge problem.
I don't know if we have a top 3 scouting network. Maybe we do. But we need to show results of it. If we do scouting just for the sake of it then it's simply a waste of money.
A good scouting system (such as Benfica, Ajax, Udinese etc) find gems before other clubs do so you have not pay grand prize for them. We nearly don’t do that. That being said we also don’t offer very good circumstances too develop such players…
That's the biggest issue at Inter. When Torino signed Schuurs he cost just 9m. Now they value him for 50m. Napoli signed Kvaradona for 10m. Atalanta signed Lookman for 9m. When Bremer first emerged at Torino in 2020/21 he cost a lot less. You need to sign these players when they're still under the radar. If you wait for those guys to become proven they will be out of reach.
Look at Dortmund for example. They signed Hummels from Bayern academy. They signed Lewa straight from Poland. They signed Sancho from City academy. They signed Bellingham from Championship. If they waited for these guys to become proven they would have never signed them. And that's why it's imperative to have a top scouting network you count on for those risks to be successful more often than not.
Also we need to become a lot better at developping youngsters. We give playing time to youngsters only when they're just too good (Bastoni). Else they get benched over experienced players. Look at Asllani for example, who's raw but promising. It's a fucking travesty he has got less playing time than Gagliardini at an expiring contract. Why would a youngster choose Inter when he knows coach will bench him for an experienced player?