In the 76 years since George Robledo was the first player born in South America who participated in the top flight, English football has always monitored developments there.
When Ossie Ardiles and Ricky Villa did not long after Argentina arrived at Tottenham, the World Cup of 1978, the interest among clubs and fans rose. Ardiles and Villa built a path that fellow South American stars such as Luis Suarez, Sergio Aguero and Gilberto Silva would follow.
Although there have been countless South Americans in the English top flight, a relatively small number has moved directly from there to England.
Since the founding of the Premier League in 1992, English clubs have generally preferred these players to prove themselves elsewhere in Europe before they take their step. There are of course exceptions, such as Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano and Gabriel Jesus, but the approach has often been careful.
Now Nottingham Forest is one of the clubs that take on a more assertive style. The days of Forest's chaotic recruitment drive after they have won promotion three years ago have long since disappeared, with the club now using an extremely smart transfer policy to stimulate their push for the Champions League.
When they signed Murillo of Corinthians for only £ 10 million in August 2023, Forest proved that there was talent in South America who could immediately adapt to Premier League football.
They had seen a glimpse of midfielder Danilo, who did well in phases since he came to Forest from Palmeiras in January 2023, but Murillo is a very different thing. It seems inevitable that one day the 22-year-old will wear the white of Real Madrid.
Forest now has six players from South America in the team of the first team: Brazilians Murillo, Danilo, Morato and Carlos Miguel, Argentinian Nicolas Dominguez and Paraguayan Ramon Sosa. Yet this is just the beginning. Last summer, Forest Pedro Ferreira tempted to leave Benfica with the Portuguese giants after 17 years.
Ferreira is an expert in South American football and will lead the transfer strategy of Forest in that part of the world, with George Syrianos, an old ally of the Marinakis family, who does the same in Europe.
The rent of Ferreira was a serious coup, because Benfica has long been considered one of the best in identifying and developing South American talent.
Hiring experts alone is not sufficient. Forest is not the only English club trying to recruit directly from South America, in particular Brazil. Wolves have an excellent network in the country and bought Brazil – midfielders Joao Gomes and Andre for a combined £ 33 million – each would only give the order more than that today.
Vitor Reis moved directly from Palmeiras to Manchester City and skipped the traditional stopover in Portugal or France.
Brazilian clubs have linked to this and Mail Sport understands that the prizes for players such as Murillo and Joao Gomes will soon be a thing of the past. The Brazilian competition is comfortably the richest in South America and their most powerful clubs can afford to bend their muscles.
Partly because of these changing trends, Mail Sport Bose owner Evangelos Marinakis understands provisional plans to invest directly in Brazilian football. Former Arsenal sports director Edu, who won 15 caps for Brazil and was previously the general coordinator of the national team, will play a global role in the Marinakis rich and has excellent ties in his home country.
An idea is to buy a controlling share in a club, possibly outside the top flight, and to set up a separate academy with a direct link to the club in question.
The best Academy players can then be exposed to the first team of football away from the spotlights and the most talented preparation for a move to Europe, where Marinakis controls three clubs: Forest, Olympiacos and Rio Ave, who are 11th in the Portuguese Premier League.
Although the plans are at a very early stage, Rio Ave could offer an ideal gateway to forest, or other clubs in the top five competitions. Because Portuguese is their first language, many Brazilian players welcome the idea to move to Portugal and that route has yielded countless success stories.
However, the eyes of Forest are not only on Brazil, as demonstrated by the conquest of SOSA last summer of the Argentinian club of tales. In Argentina, even the top clubs miss the richness of their Brazilian counterparts and many Premier League clubs now focus their attention on the country that Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi produced.
It is also not only Argentina. Brighton signed Alexis Mac Allister of Argentinos Juniors – the first club of Maradona – almost six years ago and they also have excellent ties with Ecuadorian Club Independente del Valle, who signed Moises Caicedo from there for £ 4 million in 2021 before selling him in Chelsea for almost 30 times that sum. Kendry Paez, one of the highest rated prospects in world football, will join Caicedo at Chelsea van Independente for £ 17 million this summer.
The data -based recruitment system from Brighton, conceived by owner Tony Bloom, holds it first in the global recruitment drive, but Forest proves that they are not far behind.
Although Albion's methods are almost entirely based on data, Forest also implements 'Eyes in the stand' scouts around the world and, like a number of English clubs, they realize that there is value in Ecuador outside Independent.
Expect that Premier League clubs will start shopping in Ecuadorian football, with the current competition leaders Barcelona Sporting Club (not to be confused with the La Liga Giants) and Deportivo Cuenca who attracts special attention.
Whatever way you look at it, the landscape of scouting and recruitment changes. When the United Kingdom voted in 2016 to leave the European Union, it had a major impact on the way English clubs do business.
With larger entry thresholds for EU players, the smartest British clubs began to broaden their horizon. This is clear in the championship, where there is now a strong Japanese contingent, and the Premier League went all the way in South America.
Even with the prices in Brazil, it remains an excellent market. On this continent of football, players are used to playing under pressure from a young age. The technical level is high, the mentality often excellent.
The Forest deal for Murillo is one of the best transfers of recent times. And if the club can continue to come in South America, this is probably the first of many.
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