All the President's men

Daydream, just for a moment, if you will.

You're the manager of a football club, your team are doing reasonably well and then you find out some of your key players have been sold behind your back.

Worse still you arrive at training to find that a player you never wanted has pitched up and is ready to train.

Welcome to West Ham United and Newcastle United.

It's how they do things on the continent. Presidential elections at major Spanish clubs have been won or lost by the promise of a major new signing arriving at the club. Ramón Calderón Ramos promised Robben, Fabregas and Kaka on the back of his success. Not quite.

It happened at Barcelona in the early 1980s when Diego Maradona arrived courtesy of President Josep Lluís Núnez. Argentine coach César Luis Menotti was rather pleased to have the world's greatest player on board. And then Terry Venables replaced Menotti and swiftly put his foot down - they didn't do things like that at QPR or Crystal Palace.

Maradona was sent packing to Napoli and replaced by Scotland's plodding centre-forward Steve Archibald. (Younger readers, imagine selling Kaka and signing Kenny Miller instead)

The upshot is that it's now happening in England. Has it ever happened at Albion?

Well there was certain innuendo some years ago regarding a few players. Without going into detail - in case our lawyers are watching - it was never proven, so let's leave it there. It was either true or rubbish, depending on who you believed at the time.

Albion already have a continental-style management structure, which incorporates a Sporting and Technical Director. Just as Newcastle and West Ham do.

Yet Albion's works well because everyone follows the same rules.

Tony Mowbray certainly has interesting views on the matter. According to the Albion boss the owners of any club have a right to run it as they say fit. But when it comes to dictating which players arrive at or leave the club? Well...you can read what Mowbray has to say about it in Friday's Birmingham Mail and birminghammail.net from late morning.