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The DOF role is inevitable for any successful club from now on, I think. United and Arsenal essentially DO have a DOF - the DOF is the head of State, the man who's not three games from the sack who can get players to fit a settled system with a long term plan. If your vision is long term, then you have to have a structure in place that is geared towards the long term. Brendan Rodgers may well have agreed to spend his entire transfer budget on under 23s or whatever but if he has, he's got more courage than most managers. A manager's fist priority is not to get sacked and the long term view is for those precious few managers who have a degree of job security. When Hodgson came in he saw the acadamy players as trading chips to get veteran players that could help him keep his job in the short term . Even Rafa, had he felt fully secure in the job would probably have swerved Degen, Voronin, Itanje, Jovanovic etc. knowing these contracts could bite him in the a*** in three years. This concept should be familiar to FSG - there are two relevant models in baseball - the "win now" model, where you have a good team that has a limited window to become a great team. In this case you might gut your minor league prospects for short term rentals to push you over the edge. The second is the opposite - you don't anticipate your team will be challenging for a few years so you flip your best players for prospects and concentrate on the higher draft picks that losing teams get. I think FSG view Rodgers as a long term appointment but the problem they have is that any manager is going to concentrate on his short term survival first. They've made it even harder by sacking Kenny, having that clown Ayre say that cups don't matter and basically give many people the impression that a new manger gets one season to get it right or he's offski. If they've just appointed Brendan Rogers as a traditional manager then they've made his job exponentially harder by this whole circus that began with sacking Kenny

Or possibility 3 - they ignored him for political reasons. The thing that really terrifies me (if true) is the abandoning of Van Gaal and the DOF role. If you have a structure in place and there's a guy at the top who isn't fearing for his job and is willing to make long term signings and decisions then an ambitious young coach like Rodgers makes a deal of sense. If you remove that structure at Rodgers' behest - then you've just gone and sacked Kenny Dalglish and ignored Rafa Benitez and appointed the manager of Swansea to do the exact job they were wanting. Without a DOF, Rodgers looks an unbelievable gamble. Even worse, to embark on a process with a structure in mind and to then abandon that structure at the 11th hour is very concerning. None of this is intended as a slight against Brendan Rodgers who's clearly an intelligent and confident coach but FSG are beginning to worry me

I read that as "behind the scones". Would be a good location for a hidden camera in the cafeteria, mind. Do they even have a cafeteria at Melwood? They probably have something but posher, like a Buttery or a Patisserie. One of those lah de dah places where the chef's wash their hands after having a s*** and stuff

The thing is, if Van Gaal comes to Liverpool he's doing it to win. And he won't come unless he's been sold an idea or a project. If they appoint Van Gaal then I would be a lot more excited about the ambition of FSG. It would also mitigate the extremely lacklustre selection of managerial candidates. Still got my money on McParland for DoF but if Van Gaal gets it we're fighting, at least

I think it's been Martinez for FSG all along. I think he actually makes sense with Van Gaaal. Seems a personable bloke and someone who works with what he's got rather than someone who needs a specific system. More of a field engineer than an architect. The Van Gaal idea is .ace. I think this is all going to end badly whatever way it goes, with FSG's underwhelming list of candidates. At least with Van Gaal it'll be fun along the way and there is the possibility for a good thrashing for Downing pour decourager les autres

If you're on the lookout for a new manager you basically have two sensible options: 1) Find a manager who is proven to be at or above your current level and persuade him to come to you by whatever means necessary, be they salary, WARCHEST (swoopy woopy), grand vision or whatever. 2) Find a manger who is at the level below yours you you think has the potential to rise to and exceed your current level. The problem with Martinez is that he isn't in category 1 nor is he in category 2. He's current level is a couple of rungs below a club whose avowed intent is to challenge for the Champions' League next season. Martinez for Villa would be a good fit. If he got Villa playing nice football and had them challenging for UEFA places in a couple of season s then that's the point at which you'd say Liverpool might come calling. He seems talented, thoughtful and enthusiastic but this is a big appointment in Liverpool's history and beating the drop three years running is a good start but it's logical to want more of a track record than that, no? PS. How was the Silent Sleep gig? Been listening to them on Soundcloud quite a bit.

No. There are two elephants. And a goose. Be very wary of the goose

Well, Capellio's CV is pretty outstanding in its own right, but I agree - if they want Capello then they're pretty much admitting that they want the kind of pragmatism, tack record and experience that Rafa would bring without having to appoint Rafa. Basically, they want the profile but not the man. If AVB says he doesn't want the job then they may end up giving it to Martinez because he's the only one that turned up for the interview. Who the f*** is going to fly to f***ing Boston for an interview unless they're desperate or out of work or just mad about baked beans?

Nah, he's blue. He used to write the match report for our games, i suppose he was their Merseyside correspondent or something. Has never written a positive word about us once, ever.

OK, so here's what's going to happen with this. Pep becomes Technical Director and, after an exhaustive search following the input of some of the greatest minds in football, a general manager is found to assist him. This man is Frank McParland. Martinez is first choice for manager but if terms cannot be agreed, after an exhaustive search following the input of some of the greatest minds in football, Steve Clarke is appointed. John and Tom go and watch baseball and expect a progress report at Christmas. If there's one thing that these seem to like, it's rearranging the deckchairs. Sine they've been here they've appointed precisely two senior people from outside the club to senior positions and both of these have now left. In six months the only memory we'll have of Jen Chang is the faintest whiff of alluring perfume in the press box

Hang on.... the world's gone made. Cobs will be changing his name back to Carheex next

He is English though so probably not completely naive to the country's press culture

The way things are going I expect the general manager to compliment Segura to be Frank McParland. From the time they came to the club, FSG have appointed precisely two people not already on the payroll to senior administrative positions. Both have now left. After exhaustive searches. The desire to move deckchairs and give "well thought of" people already in place a new job and badge is concerning

It's true, though, I think. You tend to know within 48 hours who the next man is going to be. The idea that they are interviewing half a dozen candidates with no prejudice about who they're going to pick doesn't have any basis in football history. I remember when Evans was first on the block the name Houllier came up and was bookies' favourite (I'd never heard of him at the time). Obviously Moores then fudged it but the successor was known. When Houllier left, Benitez came out of left field almost instantly and within a few days Bascombe was reporting it as a certainty in the Echo. I can't say with certainty on Hodgson as I was avoiding reading anything about us following the sacking of Benitez but we all knew it was Hodgson from the off, didn't we? All the smoke signals have been about Martinez (even allowing for that fat Tory c*** Whelan's publicity seeking).All the press is about the man who's going to get the gig It's Roberto Martinez as next Liverpool manager.

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There's every reason to keep believing in Kenny as manager because, well, it's Kenny Dalglish. However, there are legitimate concerns about the direction of this side and about whether this collapse can be reversed. It's a f***ing horrible conversation to be having and a lot of people are simply looking for evidence of a plan in place to get us out of this hole. Dismissing people as "Sky generation" isn't going to work, especially when you've got a bit of form for being kneejerk yourself

I think the cups thing is a bit of a canard. The line "Liverpool exists to win silverware"used a lot and is fair enough, but once upon a time the teams that concentrated on knockout competitions at the expense of the league were the likes of Spurs - way below what we were achieving. Liverpool exists to win football matches and winning trophies is a byproduct of winning matches. 7th versus 10th doesn't change anything at this stage, nor really does two cups versus one when we're the softest of soft touches in the league.

There was a chap called "Case" who used to post on here when Benitez was first appointed. He was fairly well known at the time for wanting the manger sacked before the end of 2004. A brave soul, he spoke out even before the likes of Kev did about the Spaniard. I'm only mentioning this because, however much one may argue that Rafa's time was up when he eventually departed, someone who was so desperate to see the back of him a couple of months into the job should probably hold the f*** off from lecturing Liverpool fans on how to loyally support their manager.

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Me too - I wonder if I'm getting suckered in by the physical resemblance, though

It's odd how Ferguson is so insecure. He simply cannot and will not abide a level playing field. He's like someone who as been playing the same video game for 20+ years, is as good as anyone who has ever played the game but still plays in easy mode.

Interesting team Adam, Speo and Henderson as a central 3 with Bellamy and Suarez cutting in from the flanks behind Carroll?

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was he known to hold an opinion on black men dating white women?