Following on from the recent article Fate Forging our Destiny, the vast majority of fans on the ToffeeWeb Forum have indicated — far more in sorrow than in anger — that they share the feeling of trepidation about the games we have left this season (in the Premiership?).

What concerns many is not the undoubted professionalism and dedication of many, many people employed by Everton Football Club.  It is the perception of the club to our fans as well as outsiders and of course, ultimately its performance on the pitch.  Just like politics, perception is everything and — as we all well know — Everton are perceived as dull, desperate and decaying, having become the detritus of the rock-solid Premiership outfit we once were.

One voice did point out that everybody employed at the club shouldn’t be tarred with same brush as the Board, Manager, Head Coach and playing staff, because at least most of them are doing their job properly.

It worries me that what was primarily a plaintive plea "that something must be done" could be viewed as a direct or indirect criticism of any or ALL of the non-playing staff at the club.  I share the view that, at many levels, many people are doing extraordinary jobs.  The old World War One expression "lions led by donkeys" springs to mind, but that is probably a tad too unfair as the number of the second noun could probably be singular rather than plural.

I do believe that most of the staff and all of the fans are the victims of a decision-making process that is seriously flawed.  I stand by my comment that at the top level (i.e. the Everton Board) we have a part-time commitment leading to a full-time shambles.  Decisions appear to be taken according to the London Bus school of management in that they come in "bunches" with long periods of inactivity in between.

These decisions are often reactive to events rather than as the consequence of a decisive plan and inevitably consist of a series of fire-fighting initiatives rather than looking to the future.  The Board (a.k.a. Pugh, Pugh, Barney, McGrew Cuthbert, Dibble and Grub) appear to be acting like a Trumpton fire engine, chasing around with klaxons blaring trying to find a striker who will act to salvage our Premiership status.  Has it really come to this?  Did anybody really believe, last summer, that three strikers was enough to last a full Premiership campaign?

The honourable exception to the current debacle is the Kings Dock, but that is probably because that project is being taken forward outside of the present-day structure of the club.  The result, I believe, of an experienced professional having a major say in a project that he understands from top to bottom.  A person who also always remembers that the KD project is always his Number One priority.

There is no clear vision, in the short to medium term, we are left with a long-term vision for the club that doesn’t go beyond the entertainment shangri la that KD will become, acting as a milch cow as Everton will soon go on to dominate European Football and all — so we are led to believe — just a few years down the line.  I actually fully support the KD project but the club doesn’t half make it difficult to understand and support.  It seems to believe that translucency and opaqueness are EFC’s preferred option to transparency.

There appears to be a siege mentality that has settled on Goodison Park, where legitimate concerns as to how the club is run are seen as general attacks on the professional integrity of the Board and its vice-Chairman.

That is a direct consequence of present-day leadership.  Furthermore there appears, at times, a degree of deliberate departmental polyocracy, whereby different departments are competing for the "affections" of the club's leadership, which has engendered an atmosphere that can only be described as the opposite of cohesiveness.

Many of the attacks in the past, I believe, have been merely expressions of deep and long-experienced frustrations with the way the club has been run since before the Peter Johnson era.  Lady Grantchester (new money and hereditary titles has not often been a recipe for a high IQ) has a lot to answer for, although PJ's era was an appalling Interregnum.  What could you expect from a man who made most of his money on the back of money-lending/collecting and exploiting home-workers (people who are often the most vulnerable members of society), and losing it on madcap junk-food schemes?  It would have been more apt if it had been called PJ Fuddles.

What is now apparent, as we face up to the real prospect of the R-word, is that, if we go down, who is going to be the lightening rod of the fans’ frustrations?  Who will forever be talked about in the same sentence as words such as infamy, eternal shame and others much, much worse?  Remember, Walter and Archie can decamp at any time they choose — back to the comfort of that Calvinist bastion of progressive thought and tolerance known as Ibrox.  The spotlight is circling the stage and it’s going to fix on somebody when the final curtain falls...

Who will be left high and dry to carry the shame?  Who will be the target (much of which will be undeserved) of the fans’ anger?  Who’s going to have to sign the redundancy letters to many highly dedicated people?  Who’s going to have to explain the economics of securitisation to the banks on the basis of 10,000 annual season-ticket sales?

There has to be full-time executive leadership based at Goodison — that person has to be given carte blanche by the Board to do whatever they wish to do in every non-playing area of the club's activity.  The manager either shares that vision or accepts that they are only responsible for coaching the team.

The leadership of the club — and that means you, Bill Kenwright — either has to commit full-time or delegate executive responsibility.  It is not an impossible task; it’s what happens in modern management up and down the country.  You can’t do it all on your own.  Either take the fans with you (including widening the ownership base of the club) or be hoisted by your own petard.

It shouldn’t have come to this.  Your heart is in the right place and your undoubted dedication deserves better, but success has many fathers; failure is a bastard, but the Child Protection Agency will be coming after you.

Something needs to be done and it needs to be done NOW.  Decisions have to be made; not doing anything is a decision in itself — deferring a decision until later is the worst decision of all.  You either stick or twist, you don’t become a rabbit in the headlights.  Evertonians expect and deserve better.  By the way, a man left dangling is the least motivated man of all.

I hope nobody takes this personally, I actually believe that what I have written is a mild expression of what many reasonable Evertonians believe and that if I am wrong then we go back to how the club presents itself and how it is perceived as a result of its own (in)actions.

Tony Wooly

PS Even if we beat Liverpool and triumph against the mighty Crewe, everything that has been written above will remain valid; things will only be deferred.  Part-time commitment does not lead to full-time success.