I picked up an interesting and somewhat enlightening snippet from Joe Masi's podcast. You may question Masi's insight but whatever he does put out there is generally well sourced and he doesn't take flyers on bits of ill-informed gossip.
His understanding of how recruitment works is that the Head Coach gives Dowling a list of players and it is Dowling's job to get the players. If for whatever reason he can't get a player on the list then it is down to Dowling to suggest an alternative . To get further insight Masi has tried to get an interview with Ian Pearce Albion's head of recruitment but apparently Pearce does not do media.
I am fairly certain this is how Pulis worked with Hammond. Equally it kind of makes sense of the our recruitment across the last couple of seasons.
It is wrong on many levels. Why is it like this? I'm not sure but I suspect it goes back to the ownership and what they inherited from the Pulis era and was reinforced by Williams. It might and should have changed under Jenkins but maybe there were other fires to put out and without the ability to do something else Head Coach led recruitment is the default.
Who should it be then, the coach or the DoF? Surely a collaborative approach is the way to go.
If the coach has autonomy and requests players that we can't afford (Watkins), or don't want to come (Robinson), then where do we go? He would have to spend so much time drawing up his list of alternatives to alternatives etc. he would have no time for the players he already has.
If the DoF has autonomy then the coach will be constantly outraged by decisions made "over his head" and players he didn't want (Grosicki / Kipre)
The two most prominent examples of both this season:
Bilic held out for Grant despite him being over-priced and ultimately not suited to our style.
Hegazi sold without Bilic's knowledge.
What we need is a clear plan and structure, where the coach and DoF work as a team, they are on the same side after all.
We need DoF with a clear philosophy, who recruits accordingly whilst the coach has to become interchangeable as, if we do badly he will be sacked, if we do well he could be poached. The only way we have a manager long term is if we become incredibly mediocre, so we need a system that allows us to change coach with minimum disruption. It's all a bit "Brentford" on the face of it, but, one crucial part that is missing for them is that they haven't tried it in the Premier League.......yet.
To end on a positive though, next season is the optimum time to change. We have a manager out of contract, we have maximum parachute payments, we have saleable, but replaceable, assets and the nucleus of a squad that has achieved promotion before. Just get a competent, forward thinking DoF and the sky's the limit.