All this rubbish talk about age, i am much older than 71, and i have all my marbles, i mean, err, what was the post about?? transfers was it?it will come to me soon.

I am not far off Hodgson's age - I am 65.
From experience I have to disagree with the general thrust of these sentiments.

It's been proven how stressful management at this level is, on the heart and blood pressure.

I haven’t read all of this thread, so this has probably been said but the reason this idea is silly is, much as it would be nice to have a long term plan, it’s not realistic. Every manager is a few results away from the sack. Roy has a contract, which I believe he will fulfil and that’s as long term as it gets.

What’s the alternative? Invest in and gamble on an inexperienced coach and groom them for the job when Roy retires? And then what? He makes a name for himself and goes to a bigger club or he struggles and gets sacked.

The next time we’re without a manager, we’ll have to interview the best candidates around at the time, and that’s it.

Yes I agree with the central tenet of your argument.

Situations are very 'Fluid' in football so perhaps the best one can do is to adopt the model akin to the 'Black Box' used at Southampton where managers and coaches are analysed and scrutinised over a period and if one loses one's manager one can use the 'Black box' details to selection possible candidates depending on their availability etc etc, adopting a realistic and pragmatic approach.

Yes I agree with the central tenet of your argument.

Situations are very 'Fluid' in football so perhaps the best one can do is to adopt the model akin to the 'Black Box' used at Southampton where managers and coaches are analysed and scrutinised over a period and if one loses one's manager one can use the 'Black box' details to selection possible candidates depending on their availability etc etc, adopting a realistic and pragmatic approach.