Do we need a DOF?

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Brands was known for wanting a model of buying younger talent, nurturing it and building for the future with sell on value. This is akin to PSV, Ajax, Brighton etc.

After Silva went, Carlo came in and brought in older players, on higher wales and with no sell-on value. Now, I'm not discussing or discrediting Carlo here...

... but, as a DoF this must undermine the whole long-term plan you have, if responsibility for transfers and talent is split with others, or you're simply overruled.

What was the long term plan? We already know Moshiri had form for meddling in transfers, and we know that Bill liked to have his mucky fingers in negotiations.

So, was it ever going to work? Again, I ain't saying Brands was blameless, far from it, but I perceive that the situation was probably chaotic, at best.
The thing with Brands is, as you say, the constant undermining - he quit around Xmas IIRC the second his PSV job was back, and PSV are back at recruiting well, SHOCKINGLY. People also slag him off but we're currently nurturing some of the talents he brought in himself in the youth/second team, like for example Branthwaite and no doubt others. He didn't do a fantastic job and as I said - it's not all hits, there is a gamble element to the development of players, but it seems to work in the long run for teams that want to compete with younger talent and use recruitment.

We have no long term plan and won't let him do his job, for us - it makes no sense until this changes. It's a proven good model when it's transparent and everyone knows what they do, but alas.

BTW, the Brighton technical director (or similar, "loan manager" more accurately I guess) is David Weir lol
 

So far up until Thelwell we've hired fancy famous names as DoF and given them absolutely nothing to work with and they quit. It will never work if their actions are held and dismissed at nearly every step, or if the board themselves don't know what they want. When we hired Lampard the fans had to decide who the manager should be, as the board were sucking their thumbs and feuding with eachother as we were sinking.

It will not work for Kev if we also don't let him actually do his job and he'll be scapegoated, which is already happening, even though he's 100% not helping himself on this front as well.

They didn’t quit did they, they were sacked, one can only assume because of a lack of deemed competency and value for investment, across the metrics. Now whether the people making those decisions or not, we can agree unlikely. They however where given significant resources both in terms of transfer fees and scope of contracts - so I’d disagree there has been fiscal investment - but that’s just one metric.

Someone said above, its impossible to have a direct opinion on the DOF role because none of us know the exact impact of governance on each metric, so in a sense that cuts both ways, it’s just basic science of probability, if we don’t know, then there are two outcomes - one where governance is impactful to a DOF, the other where it’s not. Everything else by that premise is speculation, opinion and assumption. Not saying it’s not true, just playing the premise. If you break it down further to each metric, it’s simply becomes a singularity.
 
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They didn’t quit did they, they were sacked, one can only assume because of a lack of deemed competent and value for investment, across the metrics. Now whether the people making those decisions or not, we can agree unlikely. They however where given significant resources both in terms of transfer fees and scope of contracts - so I’d disagree there has been fiscal investment - but that’s just one metric.

Someone said above, its impossible to have a direct opinion on the DOF role because none of us know the exact impact of each metric, so in a sense that cuts both ways, it’s just basic science of probability, if we don’t know, then their are two outcomes - one where governance is impactful to a DOF, the other where it’s not. Everything else by that premise is speculation, opinion and assumption. Not saying it’s not true, just playing the premise. If you break it down further to each metric, it’s simply becomes a singularity.
Brands quit from his positions with immediate effect the day his PSV job was available. Why'd you think that is?
 
Optics, he got the bullet.
He got the bullet, in which he basically walked out at the first opportunity after the owner(s) hired 2 managers he never wanted to even work with and hid from public speaking in his last year as he was obviously being ignored and had no input. Even when he left he cited something along the lines of "misalignment with the views of the future" or the likes.

Sure, "fired", but he definitely didn't go down fighting, and there was no reason for him to do so. As there won't be for anyone if they continue doing whatever they want. He could've probably kept his place as a board member as the Swine has for a long, long time, but he never did. Wonder why he gave up everything so quickly?

To base it down - I know I didn't want to talk to my bosses when they kept ignoring my advice/requests and doing whatever they wanted to do behind my back in my old job, it's part of the reason the first offer from another place came I instantly jumped. Loved the job, loved the place, but the bosses made it insufferable. No idea why it's difficult for people to understand that it's the same with football "admin" work like technical/sporting/football directors.
 

He got the bullet, in which he basically walked out at the first opportunity after the owner(s) hired 2 managers he never wanted to even work with and hid from public speaking in his last year as he was obviously being ignored and had no input. Even when he left he cited something along the lines of "misalignment with the views of the future" or the likes.

Sure, "fired", but he definitely didn't go down fighting, and there was no reason for him to do so. As there won't be for anyone if they continue doing whatever they want. He could've probably kept his place as a board member as the Swine has for a long, long time, but he never did. Wonder why he gave up everything so quickly?

To base it down - I know I didn't want to talk to my bosses when they kept ignoring my advice/requests and doing whatever they wanted to do behind my back in my old job, it's part of the reason the first offer from another place came I instantly jumped. Loved the job, loved the place, but the bosses made it insufferable. No idea why it's difficult for people to understand that it's the same with football "admin" work like technical/sporting/football directors.

He got the bullet, for making a snarky comment about the club coming up the stand after he was confronted for putting together - let’s say - manure squad - by a fan and it leaked all over Social media. That and torpedoing our finances and putting together a squad that’s was unsellable and lads just running down their contracts after 100s of millions in investment.

A sweetheart deal was done, he doesn’t dish specific dirt - the club would say it was a mutual decision and he preserves his reputation. It wasn’t his first opportunity to leave either, he could have left at any time, he was happy enough to ride the gravy train, until his time came to be cooked in the oven.

He was on the very board, everyone’s protesting about now - too funny, saying he couldn’t do his job because of poor governance when the dude was that governance.
 
He got the bullet, for making a snarky comment about the club coming up the stand after he was confronted for putting together - let’s say - manure squad - by a fan and it leaked all over Social media. That and torpedoing our finances and putting together a squad that’s was unsellable and lads just running down their contracts after 100s of millions in investment.

A sweetheart deal was done, he doesn’t dish specific dirt - the club would say it was a mutual decision and he preserves his reputation. It wasn’t his first opportunity to leave either, he could have left at any time, he was happy enough to ride the gravy train, until his time came to be cooked in the oven.

He was on the very board, everyone’s protesting about now - too funny, saying he couldn’t do his job because of poor governance when the dude was that governance.
He has given an interview since in which he was critical of the problems he faced with interference while he was here.
 
Kind of agree, while Kev is doing a very good job if he ever got poached we should leave the model.
Just one example of Farhads terrible ownership

….amazed how anybody thinks Thelwell is ’doing a good job’ when he’s demonstrated gross negligence leaving us without an effective back up striker for TWO windows. For that reason alone he should be sacked. Anybody who thinks Thelwell is decent probably thought Benitez was the right man for the job.

Regardless, it’s not whether we should have a DOF or not. Modern day managers work with DoF, very few have the capacity to know the global market or watch games relentlessly like in days of old.

The issue is bringing in the right DoF. I’m convinced that Thelwell is not a DoF, he’s clearly not a judge of a player and openly admits he’s a ‘Line Manager’. I’m convinced Brands was a much more effective DoF than Thelwell but it’s difficult to judge his record because of interference in the role.
 
He got the bullet, for making a snarky comment about the club coming up the stand after he was confronted for putting together - let’s say - manure squad - by a fan and it bring all over Social media. That and torpedoing our finances and putting together a squad that’s was unsellable and lads just running down their contracts. A sweetheart deal was done, he doesn’t dish specific dirt - the club would say it was a mutual decision and he preserves his reputation. It wasn’t his first opportunity to leave either, he could have left at any time, he was happy enough to ride the gravy train, until his time came to be cooked in the oven.

He was on the very board, everyone’s protesting about now - too funny, saying he couldn’t do his job because of poor governance when the dude was that governance.
He wasn't though, blatantly you can't see or just don't want to see that - he went on record to speak out against the board's decisions which went above him;
he didn't want Silva (at first, wanted to work with him afterwards);
he didn't want Rafael (board chose him instead of Brands);
he didn't want Carlo and his recruitment strategy of, again, going above him with the board's help and getting in players he wanted - the same players you're blaming him for - like James, Doucoure, Alan et al. He's very much against signing aging players in general, that's why he was nowhere to be seen when we signed most of those - they weren't his idea of a good transfer, and he was right.

When Rafael botched the squad that was in place and he got annoyed and argued with a fan saying exactly that - the board spoke up in defence of Rafael ( lol ) and "sacked" Brands.

His time didn't come to be cooked, he was put in a slowcooker from the start, it was bound to happen.

Regarding the "we don't knows" - we don't know which of the youth transfers are his or from his scouting team, as mentioned. That's usually how/where he operates, we've had for example Branthwaite who, shockingly, now is at PSV, funny how that works out. lol

Not saying everything he's done or wanted to do would've worked out or been better, but to demonise him for no reason is just weird when it's clear he's not done a lot of those things.

As I said - if he wanted to "ride the gravy train" he could've pulled a Kenwright and kept his spot on the board, he got removed from being a DoF, not a board member after all :)
 
….amazed how anybody thinks Thelwell is ’doing a good job’ when he’s demonstrated gross negligence leaving us without an effective back up striker for TWO windows. For that reason alone he should be sacked. Anybody who thinks Thelwell is decent probably thought Benitez was the right man for the job.
You mean Farhad Moshiri? As he thought Benitez was the right man for the job and also employed Kev?

Fact us Kev is doing a good job, resisting the urge to buy deadwood for the sake of numbers is hard, but he knew we had the players to stay up, we just needed a manager

Regardless, it’s not whether we should have a DOF or not. Modern day managers work with DoF, very few have the capacity to know the global market or watch games relentlessly like in days of old.
Is Sean Dyche a modern day mamager or old school? and are we in the global market for players?

The issue is bringing in the right DoF. I’m convinced that Thelwell is not a DoF, he’s clearly not a judge of a player and openly admits he’s a ‘Line Manager’. I’m convinced Brands was a much more effective DoF than Thelwell but it’s difficult to judge his record because of interference in the role.
Agree on this, because of Farhads interference its hard to fully judge
 

He wasn't though, blatantly you can't see or just don't want to see that - he went on record to speak out against the board's decisions which went above him;
he didn't want Silva (at first, wanted to work with him afterwards);
he didn't want Rafael (board chose him instead of Brands);
he didn't want Carlo and his recruitment strategy of, again, going above him with the board's help and getting in players he wanted - the same players you're blaming him for - like James, Doucoure, Alan et al. He's very much against signing aging players in general, that's why he was nowhere to be seen when we signed most of those - they weren't his idea of a good transfer, and he was right.

When Rafael botched the squad that was in place and he got annoyed and argued with a fan saying exactly that - the board spoke up in defence of Rafael ( lol ) and "sacked" Brands.

His time didn't come to be cooked, he was put in a slowcooker from the start, it was bound to happen.

Regarding the "we don't knows" - we don't know which of the youth transfers are his or from his scouting team, as mentioned. That's usually how/where he operates, we've had for example Branthwaite who, shockingly, now is at PSV, funny how that works out. lol

Not saying everything he's done or wanted to do would've worked out or been better, but to demonise him for no reason is just weird when it's clear he's not done a lot of those things.

As I said - if he wanted to "ride the gravy train" he could've pulled a Kenwright and kept his spot on the board, he got removed from being a DoF, not a board member after all :)

So just to summarise, you blame the board for the failure of Marcel Brands, yet Marcel Brands sat on the same board, right so mate! ;)
 
So just to summarise, you blame the board for the failure of Marcel Brands, yet Marcel Brands sat on the same board, right so mate! ;)
Yes, I blame owners for going above the DOF who is also on the board and doing whatever the want without his agreement or approval for a long term plan ;)

You're a smart man and I have no idea why it's difficult to see he wasn't in charge of about 90% of the decisions made; he's done a few interviews as well since he's left :)
 
Yes, I blame owners for going above the DOF who is also on the board and doing whatever the want without his agreement or approval for a long term plan ;)

You're a smart man and I have no idea why it's difficult to see he wasn't in charge of about 90% of the decisions made; he's done a few interviews as well since he's left :)

So you blame Moshiri as to why a DOF, won’t work at Everton. So a DOF - doesnt work at Everton defacto.

I haven’t completely abandoned the concept myself mate.
 
So you blame Moshiri as to why a DOF, won’t work at Everton. So a DOF - doesnt work at Everton defacto.

I haven’t completely abandoned the concept myself mate.
Blame both him and Kenwright for it, and it's probably still the same, even though hope it's not obviously.

Kenwright also sanctions whatever he wants himself, as does Moshiri, and when a DoF, be it Brands or literally anyone, tries to have any input - who do they answer to? To people who go above their head and just do what they want? What's the point of the position then, other than to say "look who we've got, he's worked wonders with X, will defo work here"? And then give him 0 power lol

Which is why I'm saying it won't work currently until the owner and fraud of a 'chairman' step away from what realistically shouldn't be their business. If the DoF works with Dyche to get who they both agree would be a good fit - yeah, it makes sense. Otherwise - nevermind what the DoF does, it will get devalued instantly by someone going and doing something else.

Brands wanted Potter by the way, to model a youthful team competing in a few years.... According to him we could've gotten Potter at the time, but instead went for Ancelotti as the owners liked him and the rest I already posted above. With the power of hindsight we know he's not doing great at Chelsea, but at Brighton he was doing well, so it wasn't completely bonkers as it would be now lol

So to answer the OP: we could use one, but we should probably just have a good head scout/tech director at this point and with this setup.
 

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