From Arsenal to AI: the Israeli startup transforming how clubs sign players
Dean Bracha turned his love for football into Marquee, a fast-growing sports tech company already working with major clubs across Europe, the US and beyond
When Israeli entrepreneur Dean Bracha visited the UK and attended his first Arsenal game aged nine, little did he know the club would one day form the basis of his career.
The trip to Arsenal Stadium sparked an early obsession with the Premier League team. Back in Israel, Bracha played FIFA and later Championship Manager as Arsenal, following every transfer and analysing every performance.
Years later, that same obsession would evolve into Marquee, a fast-growing sports analytics startup already gaining traction with major clubs across Europe and beyond.
Bracha and his co-founders first met through an Israeli Arsenal supporter’s community he founded, which today has more than 7,000 members. There, Bracha wrote match reviews, analysed players and discussed transfers, posting his articles online.
“I’ve always loved writing about players and analysing the game from a fan perspective,” he tells Jewish News. “It started as something fun. Then I began getting messages from scouts at clubs, both in Israel and internationally, asking how I had this information.
“If something quite simple I built was creating that much interest, I started wondering how clubs actually work today.”
Bracha began reaching out to teams in Israel, Europe and the US and quickly identified a gap: not a lack of data, but an overload of it with a lack of usable insight.
“Clubs today have moved from data scarcity to data overload,” Bracha explains. “In a single game, you can have thousands of data points. It’s impossible for humans to analyse everything.”
Most clubs, he says, use just 4 to 15 percent of the data available to them. Marquee’s goal is to unlock the remaining 85%.
The platform acts as an AI-powered decision intelligence layer, bringing together data from multiple providers and internal club systems into one place. From there, it generates clear, contextual recommendations tailored to each club’s playing style, constraints and objectives.
With a single click, clubs can generate a full player profile, covering tactical, physical and technical attributes alongside salary expectations, injury history and career trajectory – often including video analysis.
“We act as a multiplier,” Bracha says. “Our technology can do the work of 10 analysts.”
“Clubs don’t need more data – they need the ability to draw insights from the data they already have.”
By automating much of the recruitment process, the platform can reduce weeks of analysis to minutes, allowing scouts and analysts to focus on higher-level decision-making.
Founded less than a year ago, Marquee has already attracted backing from some of Israel’s most prominent tech and sports figures.
Its recent pre-seed round was led by AnD Ventures, with participation from with participation from Wix founders Avishai Abrahami and Omer Shai; Ami Serkis, founder and CEO of 365Scores; and venture capitalist Eyal Segal, the former owner of Maccabi Netanya Football Club.
Marquee has raised more than $2.5 million to date, including a recent investment from top tier sports tech VC, Apex Capital.
The company is already working with professional clubs across Israel, Europe and the United States, and has supported real recruitment decisions during recent transfer windows. It is also in discussions with teams across the Premier League, MLS in the US and other major teams, although many partnerships remain under wraps for now.
The plan, says Bracha, is to become “the standard operating system for recruitment teams in sport.”
Three of Marquee’s four founders are Arsenal fans – a detail that, for Bracha, is far from trivial.
“If you want to stay motivated and move fast, you have to be passionate about what you do.
“When you care about something, you think about it when you go to sleep and when you wake up. That’s what creates the drive for perfection.”
Marquee’s rapid rise has not come without challenges.
The company has been built amid the war with Iran, a reality that has directly impacted the team.
“Our CTO’s house was hit by a missile,” Bracha reveals. “Thankfully everyone is okay – but it shows the situation.”
Despite this, the company has moved at speed, developing its product in just nine months and launching publicly two months ago.
“We have elephant skin,” he says. “We keep moving. There’s no time to stop.”
For Bracha, the resilience is also driven by something deeper – a longstanding connection to the game. There is one goal that stands above the rest, even if he doesn’t say it outright.
“There are certain clubs we really want to work with..” he says, smiling.
It’s a prospect that would bring everything full circle – and one that now feels closer than ever.
Keep community journalism free.
Jewish News is free for everyone. No paywall. No barriers. Just trusted journalism for anyone who wants to stay connected to Jewish life in Britain.
If you value that, please support us.
From as little as £5 a month, you can help keep our journalism free and accessible to all.
Every day, we report on the issues that matter to our community. We celebrate achievements, support charities, challenge antisemitism and ensure Jewish voices are heard more widely.
From as little as £5 a month, you can help us continue to:
- Report on the stories shaping Jewish life in the UK and beyond
- Bring our community together through shared stories, events and campaigns
- Celebrate the people, culture and moments that define our community
- Support organisations doing vital work across Jewish Britain
You can make a one-off donation or become a regular supporter. Every contribution helps keep our journalism free, independent and accessible to all.
If everyone who values Jewish News gave a small amount, it would make a real difference to our future.
