In a nutshell
- Czech-based Eyeball.Club, a sports tech company, announced today the successful closing of a €5M seed round.
- The round was led by Vendep Capital, with participation from Sportlogiq, Heartland, and Founderment.
Football scouting with AI-driven insights
18-year-old French winger Rayan Djahl moved from Lyon Laduchère to Juventus Turin’s reserve team last summer. He was scouted and recruited through a sports tech company Eyeball.Club. Other examples of such transfers across Europe include 17-year-old Norwegian winger Daniel Skaarud, who was spotted playing for Norwegian side Lillestrøm before transferring to Ajax’s academy, and 19-year-old Ivory Coast defender Assane Ouedraogo, who moved from Ivory Coast club FC San Pedro to MLS club Charlotte FC.
The football scouting process involves a variety of methods and tools to identify and recruit talent. To combine statistics, data, psychological assessments, and physical evaluations, scouting requires comprehensive analysis. Gone are the days when scouts spent 90% of their time traveling and 10% scouting…
Czech-based Eyeball.Club is a tool that aims to revolutionize how professional football clubs scout and recruit young talent. How does it work? Their platform is built on complete match videos, utilizing computer vision AI, data analytics, and video analysis to offer clubs an in-depth perspective on emerging talent from various markets and regions worldwide.
“Our mission is clear; it is not just about finding the best talent; it’s about equipping clubs with the digital tools they need to future-proof their recruitment processes by building and securing a reliable pipeline of young talent. Whether it’s expanding scouting networks into new regions or leveraging AI-driven insights, we’re creating a new paradigm in sports tech”, shared Manfred Lerley, CEO and Co-founder of Eyeball.Club.
Other examples in the region include Romanian Nordensa. The company provides a platform for scout use, where fans can support football players to join major European clubs, acting as their backers. Earlier this year, Nordensa secured €1.65M in a seed round.
Eyeball.Club Expands Global Reach and Secures €5M Seed Round
Eyeball.Club now operates in 27 countries and is used by over 100 football clubs worldwide. This includes the majority of Premier League and Ligue 1 clubs, as well as over 50% of both the German Bundesliga and Italy’s Serie A.
“Eyeball.Club has fundamentally changed how we approach youth recruitment. Their platform allows us to identify players we might never have noticed, with data that supports long-term strategic recruitment decisions,” a spokesperson from a leading Premier League club noted.
Today, the company announced the successful closing of a €5M seed round. The round was led by Vendep Capital with participation from Sportlogiq, Heartland, and Founderment.
The new capital will fuel Eyeball.Club’s expansion into key US and Latin American markets, as well as further enhance its technology capabilities across the platform.
“We’ve seen a three-fold increase in revenue in 2024, and this latest funding round is a strong validation of our vision to redefine how talent is scouted across the globe, by top clubs,” said Lerley. “We are empowering clubs to access a broader talent pool with data-driven insights that were previously unavailable.”
Moreover, Eyeball.Club enables clubs to scout talent from underrepresented regions, previously harder to reach, with a focus on identifying football stars earlier than ever.
