If it comes off then I'll be happy enough with Vieira. He wasn't my first choice but to be fair I didn't have a first choice. Each alleged candidate had strengths and weaknesses.

Parish talked about getting someone to win games whilst developing youth, and the press said Palace preferred someone with Premier league experience. I personally placed significant weight on the hunger of the new man to succeed.

I didn't want someone like Benitez who had such a good media image that he could afford to f*** it up at Palace and not have his career damaged. I want someone who needs to succeed at Palace. That was the attraction of Ishmael and Cooper for me, and I quite like that the jury is out on Vieira as a manager and he has to prove himself.

He has done an apprenticeship rather than trade on his status, which is vital, but remains unproven, which suits Palace. He knows the league, the culture, the language etc, and has worked with youth players at City, as well as seeing a small army of promising youngsters try but fail to make it at arsenal in his playing days, so should have seen both sides of that particular coin.

All in all, he's a perfectly good candidate and if he's hungry for the job then that probably moves him above Nuno and Favre, neither of whom were.

Not to worry, if it doesn't work out, because FDB has just become available!

Unusually bereft of punctuation, if you don't mind me saying so?

Ultimately he'll be judged on results irrespective of the colour of his skin, the same way we judge the players. It is unavoidable that the topic will come up though given the lack of black managers at the top level of the game. Hopefully he can be a positive role model and give confidence to other black players considering a career in management. There's no harm in that.

If anyone seriously thinks Parish would hire someone just because of the colour of their skin then they probably need to stop watching re-runs of Jim Davidson's Big Break and live in the real world.

Most of us were scarred by the FbD debacle. So any 'ex-world-class' player coming to manage Palace has that feel about it. Worried he will expect too much from our very-average players.

On the plus side he will be hungry for success. I think we need that at this stage, not another been there, seen-it-all yawn manager. Also as has been said, might be an asset on the recruitment front.

Any reasonable incoming candidate would do me at this stage so we can just get on with it and sort out next season.

I doubt we'll be criticised for not having interviewed any white, male, English candidates.

Palace since 19 August 1972. Palace 1 (Tony Taylor) Liverpool 1 (Emlyn Hughes)