Everton new manager decision big test for Brands

As Everton supporters continue to digest the huge shock of Carlo Ancelotti’s departure to Real Madrid yesterday, the club’s board are once again back to square one trying to find yet another new first team manager.

One key figure in this process will be Marcel Brands, who is of course the Everton Director of Football. Brands has just got himself a new three year contract and now it’s time for him to earn the faith shown in him, that’s always assuming he will be central to these discussions!

I’m nor sure what to think of the Dutchman’s time at Goodison Park and whether it’s been successful or not.

He arrived known as a well-regarded behind-the-scenes operator with a good reputation for finding young unsung talent, particularly from South America. He had successfully built several winning teams in Holland and had been on the radar of several top European clubs, including apparently Chelsea.

There were though questions about whether the club needed a Director of Football type at all and that’s still a debate that hasn’t been conclusively settled.

One important aspect of his appointment was to try and establish a clear identity and a so-called ‘club DNA’, at Goodison Park.

This was a concept that would in theory anyway, allow the Blues to establsih a way of playing right throughout the various youth and senior teams and seamlessly bring through players as well as cope with managerial comings and goings wihtout it upsetting the culture that had been established.

I do think it is important that Everton have a sense of football identity but it’s proving much more difficult to acheive when the club is in so much constant turmoil and upheavel with managers coming and going and no sense of stability.

So far Brands’ time at the Toffees has been a mixed bag with some good overall signings such as Lucas Digne and Yerry Mina but also a few who haven’t worked out like Andre Gomes and most especially, Moise Kean.

Kean’s arrival was the exemplar of what Brands had been brought in to do – find and secure the best young talent around and build a successful team for the long-term.

The teenage Italian’s signing from Juventus was heralded as a real coup for the Blues and proof that Everton were right to bring in the Dutchman.

However, almost from the off things didn’t go well as the young striker seemed to be finding it tough adjusting to life in England. He was struggling to make an impression on the training ground in front of a manager in Marco Silva who didn’t seem particularly interested in using him.

There were disciplinary incidents and then the notorious moment when interim boss Duncan Ferguson brought him on at Old Trafford and then a few minutes later yanked him off again as Everton battled for a draw against Manchester United.

When he did get a few other limited chances under both Silva and then after Ancelotti took over, he didn’t do much and there was a sense he was ill-suited to life at Goodison Park. So last summer he finally went on loan to PSG just before the end of the transfer window and his future is very uncertain although it seems unlikly we will see him wearing Everton royal blue again.

And the Dutchman was also brought in to clear out the large number of other underperforming or fringe squad players left over from previous season’s of extravagant spending and all costing the club massive wages. Again he’s had limited success doing that with a significant number of these players still on the club’s books.

Furthermore that ‘DNA’ is still not clear, at least to me anyway and was it seems shelved when Ancelotti arrived with the Italian moving away from youngsters to buy older, more established players for what everyone hoped would be a quick fix to the problems on the pitch.

Anyway the point of all this is to emphasise that Brands’ track record is certainly not a total success or a complete failure but that the jury is still very much out on his tenure at the club.

Now comes a massive summer once again. It was going to be challenging enough just in terms of the transfers he needed to engineer as the need for major reinforcements throughout the team was again underlined by last season’s wildly inconsistent form and disappointing conclusion.

But of course with yesterday’s shock developments comes the huge additional problem of finding another new manager before those transfer plans can even be considered.

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In some ways the fact Ancelotti has gone now is good in that had it been a few months later then it would have been near impossible to get a replacement in, settle everything and find the players the new coach wanted in time for the new season start.

So which of the myriad possible candidates (and any others not considered) will Brands be focusing on? The short answer is I don’t know.

Eighteen months ago there seemed to be a split in the boardroom over who to bring in as Silva’s successor with some wanting a return to David Moyes and others especially Farhad Moshiri craving that ‘hollywood’ manager.

Moshiri as the owner, not suprisingly, got his way and once Ancelotti became opportunistically available all the effort and focus was on getting him.

I’m not certain which side of this debate Brands was on and how the Ancelotti saga will affect the sort of successor he lobbies for. Will he want another big name, if that’s possible, or will he be looking at a younger, less high-profile but well regarded coach such as Ralf Rangnick who would definately buy into the DNA concept or his fellow countryman Erik ten Hag?

Whoever he and the powers that be decide to give the reigns to and try once again to take this club forward, it has to be the right appointment and one that lasts for the long-term! Can they do it, we will see.