United's new chief scout (er, director.of football) might find right man...Harry Kane

Let's get one thing clear smooth blokes in smart suits do not bring trophies to football clubs.

They might play a small part but the people who are almost wholly responsible for bringing trophies to clubs are the ones with boots on, and the ones who take to the training ground in their tracksuits.

Oh, and the ones with the fat wallet.

Players, managers, owners.

If this sounds like some sort of mantra from a dinosaur age, guilty as charged.

But the cult of the sporting director, the director of football, the head of football operations, call it what you want, has gotten steadily out of control.

A lot of it, of course, is simply semantics.

A head of recruitment? Isn't that just a chief scout in old money, in the same way that transition was once just getting the ball from defence to attack? Or in the same way a pivot was once a holding midfielder? But, to be fair, even this dinosaur recognises the game off the pitch has moved on and keeps evolving.

Which is why, it seems, we are in a world of transfer markets for pen-pushers, wheeler dealers and laptop gurus.