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Meaning they have absolutely no idea who is going to replace him. The best case scenario is he’s fired today and a new guy who they’ve been sounding out for at least several weeks since the big red flags really went up about the current dud is put in place this week. But its the AFC board we’re talking about so zero chance this happens. So scrabbling about in the dark with a lame duck dead man walking manager for a good while yet it’s almost certain to be…

Seems like the problem is a fundamental lack of accountability upstairs and the buck not stopping with anyone and when it does it's just an organisational shuffle. Sounds a lot like Wood Group or Petrofac.

% of win bonuses won’t cost the club too much.

I think we all felt before the last appointment that getting it right was more important than the time but we then panicked and appointed Robinson I agree a month isn’t a long time to wait on a new appointment but concern is what further damage will be done if we don’t remove him quickly If they want to talk to him about the terms of the pay off first then fair enough- maybe can challenge the authenticity of his cv around the bit around playing pressing, attacking football I just want him gone

I'm only going on what Cormack made fairly clear when he first joined. As far as I could tell, the idea was to have a few footballing "support" departments, and that the manager was not in charge of them. Personally, I've never understood the need for a recruitment director, but that's neither here nor there. I think it muddies the water slightly. The manager is in charge of all football on-the-park, and coaching issues, and is responsible for that in full. The sporting director ensures that we have a manager that sticks to a particular strategy and that players that are signed align with that strategy. He holds the manager to account and provides "devil's advocate" in the background, questioning why he's making certain decisions and always going back to the strategy and seeing how things are progressing in alignment with that. He talks to players and is generally close to the footballing side without being overbearing. He's there because of his football knowledge, which doesn't exist on the board, and for his availability (he's full time). He transcends the manager, so that we don't have the next guy coming in and ripping everything up to start from square one again. Of course, it took Cormack six years to actually get a sporting director in, and then when he did, he overrode his decision on the manager (not without good reason, in fairness). The reason for the sporting director is fairly straightforward and makes complete sense. McInnes left, and so did sport science and recruitment, where his favourite picks were in charge. I'm fairly certain similar will happen at Falkirk when McGlynn leaves. The problem that we have is that we either keep panicking and handing everything back to the manager to control (Thelin), or just not having the staff in place when a manager arrives on their reduced remit (every manager since Cormack arrived). I haven't got a clue if Lutz is good at his job or not, but I would find it very strange if he was sacked on the basis of his entire job description being overridden by a panicked manager appointment by those above him.

I think it's not unusual for things to take a bit of time. Anyone who's dealt with solicitors and contracts will know the score. Sometimes it'll be straight forward if the manager has integrity and is easy to deal with (see Goodwin), other times it can be a battle. There's also not an immediate hurry, and the club might want to wait until closer to January for a new manager to come in so that they aren't lumbered with the shite side for too long before they can make changes, resulting in the new man starting with negativity that is difficult to shake. Obviously there's a line there somewhere, but a month's wait for a manager wouldn't be too bad. That said, if Killie get absolutely horsed today, and McCann dispatched, then we could offer him to them on a free transfer, perfect for all parties. Robinson will likely fancy it, given they managed to offload a lot of their shite like Mayo and Lyons in the summer.

Just goes to show how middle aged and out of touch with the modern corporate clown circus that is football these days I guess.

The shambles was firmly in place before he started, in both teams. I doubt he has significant input into the women's team, and not do I think anyone would care if he did. I don't think you or I have any real idea where his remit starts and ends to pass judgement. I'm actually not sticking up for Lutz because I think he's good, I'm sticking up for him because it seems like people have just decided that they need to blame someone and he's the useful idiot. I'm not seeing anything at the club just now that can be firmly pinned on Lutz's door that he either didn't inherit (there was no recruitment director when he joined) or have foisted upon him (Robinson). I think he's at fault for Aremu, Briedl, Muller and Klein, who appear to be signings that are suspiciously close to his previous contacts, but none of those are that terrible in the scheme of things.

We are apparently going to take our time and do a review during the international break I will read that to mean that we have no clue who we want to appoint and Robinsons lawyers have red lined the bit in the contract that states early termination shall result in full payout of remaining term plus a lump for agreed % of win bonuses For avoidance of doubt I have no idea what is in his contract but as we were in a shit negotiating position after the Horneland fiasco, pretty sure he is holding all the cards Unless his agent is as shite at his job as he is

Seen a few social media posts suggesting there’s no announcement coming anytime soon 👎

My understanding is that he is sporting director and since he has been appointed he has overseen nothing short of an omnishambles in both the men’s and women’s teams.

John McGlynn is a very good coach. Robinson isn't.

I don't think I've ever seen a director of football appear after the match when the manager is still in position. I'm sure you'll be able to give me an example? Robinson owns this debacle almost entirely. Those that put him in charge second. Lutz's inability to make a shite situation (employing Robinson) better isn't great, but it's not an egregious error.

Meanwhile John McGlynn just signs young players and puts them in the starting XI and has zero budget and none of this apparatus and his team looks a lot more like an Aberdeen team than ours does. Falkirk don't need to 'convince' b/c they're not playing has beens and jobbers ahead of youth. Ethan Ross used to be our player is Mahou better than him? Olusanya? Wasn't Cormack Park supposed to be about creating a first team youth pipeline and instead of that we sign Obi Wan, Chris Cadden and Brad Lyons. Lutz probably does have to have the gift of the gab to convince youth players to extend their contracts when journeymen jobbers are clogging up their route to the first team, but he's also signing on the dotted line for those jobbers as well.

Which he got criticised for, explained it was normal in Germany, but took heed and took a step back. This is a literal example of being damned if you do and damned if you don't. By all accounts his remit over summer was to sell players, which he did and apparently got good money for the departures. He didn't cover himself in glory with the manager search, but mainly because he held on for Horneland. If Horneland had taken the job, who knows how the season would have panned out and how Lutz would be looked on. Other than that, not really sure what the criticism of Lutz is. He's not taking part in training sessions and isn't picking the team, so his influence there is minimal. Signings - he's helped with some names he knows (namely Geiger - a bit of a coup at the time - and the two German goalkeepers). But Darren Mowbray has been head of recruitment since March, so are we blaming Lutz for the majority of the summer signings? Lutz has been instrumental in getting some of the younger players signed up on new contracts.

Yeah, OK. To me this just sounds like corporate doublespeak and waffle. He's ultimately responsible, he should be side by side with the manager, not using the manager as a human shield when all the salient questions land in his lap. What did Robinson actually have to say: 'it wasn't good enough' and then when it came to the accountability piece 'I'll keep fighting (i.e. my contract says if I resign I don't get severance pay)' and 'we lacked confidence'. Why not just roll out an AI chatbot to do that? This corporate structure I can see it works when what's clearly out of the manager's hands lands in the lap of the DoF, I can't see it working when the manager is trundled out as a pinata, he's on a hiding to nothing anyway so he just parrots the talking points and eats shit to collect his £250k cheque from the Chairman, and the DoF is on a private WhatsApp group asking what the going market hourly rate is to shovel shit. To me the way you're framing this is that fans get this sort of performative circus of accountability when the 'real' accountability happens in emails and on WhatsApp between people we will never meet and to whom our club is just an interesting statistic for sports betting.

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As ludicrous as sitting in a dug out with the manager? The little useless prick, and I genuinely believe he is a useless prick, needs to fuck off.

It's been less than a day. The idea that any Director of football would handle a post match conference for a manager is ludicrous, especially when he hasn't been fired. I'd expect him to be working behind the scenes to get the new person in, with interviews lined up and seeing if anyone is interested. I would expect to hear from him shortly after Robinson departs, and I would expect to hear him shoulder some of the blame. The summer signings reeked of the debacle we've seen since Cormack joined, with no clear definition of which department is responsible for which part. Robinson was clearly given too many signings. For me, all signings should go through exactly the same process. Signings are identified, processed through the recruitment/data software, weighted for risk (proven SPFL, from a league where we've got data on players who've successfully moved, unknown etc etc), with the recruitment and football directors given the final decision. I don't believe that happened with Lyons and Cadden or Mayo and Smith (although I think the latter two might have made it through this process). If we've not done this then the problem isn't with the director of football, it's with the club and its segregation of duties and processes in place. That transcends the DofF, just like shite strategies transcend a manager, and getting rid of Lutz would make zero difference. I saw Lutz at Hampden last week. I'm certain that he was there yesterday. Whether the cameras focus on him or the new guy that is deemed more interesting is neither here nor there. Do you think Lutz should have photo bombed the shot? It seems a little harsh to hold him to account for what a private TV company chooses to show its viewers.

Robinson doesn’t like Nicky Devlin types. The type who speak up off the park as well as on it. Devlin has spoken up and challenged him so I’m told. Robbo doesn’t like that so bombed him out. You can just see the likes of Lyons & Cadden etc tugging the forelock & lapping up any old shite they are fed. Robinson will love that so sure fire starters (and clueless shitebags) every week…

So they did. So that's that then, every single Premiership team have skelped us this year.

I would hate Steve Clarke to get it. Firstly, his Scotland record is pretty average. The Euros have become significantly easier to qualify for. The World Cup - everyone remembers the Denmark win, but in truth that performance came out of nowhere because we were terrible v Belarus, and extremely fortunate v Greece, while Denmark not taking care of Belarus opened an unexpected door. And, in three tournaments, Clarke's Scotland were a big let down. But mainly the reason I would hate Clarke to be the manager is his lack of vision when Scotland boss. This is a guy that repeatedly called up Grant Hanley, generally played the same way, and only now under Pocognoli are we trying some new things. He's also an arsehole.

I have to disagree with that but maybe I'm mis-reading the Director of Football role. This man Lutz bares ultimate responsibility to the CEO and Chairman for what happens on the pitch, many of those signings that are not pulling their weight, not doing the basics and fundamentals well enough, not running, not following basic instructions and are basically not cut out to be Aberdeen players are his. When Robinson suggests signings, such as Brad Lyons, such as Chris Cadden, such as Dan Happe, such as Obi Wan and shipping Lobban out of loan, freezing out Devlin, Frame, Gyamfi, Lutz' signature is on that decision and on that paperwork as well. And now the shit has hit the fan, where is he? We have Robinson wheeled out in front of the press for his post-match humiliation ritual, Robinson reports to Lutz and everything Robinson asks for goes through him, but we never see him, same as we never see Cormack. We saw Bevington in the stands after the game looking like he was about to vomit, at least he's there, he's visible, where is Lutz? Who's accountable for this to the fans? It's the one in the hierarchy who approves the decisions, ultimately, which under the Cormack structure is not the manager it's Lutz, but no one knows where he is, what he does and he's never, to my knowledge, even explained publicly what the structure is and where the responsibility lands when the plan fails. If the DoF + CEO system has any merit beyond hot dog stands and flipping players on the market like London flats, then it should be Lutz in front of the cameras rn, it should be him justifying this mess and telling us how it's going to change, but the worse it gets the more AWOL he seems to be.

I read Lutz’ contract expires next summer. Surprised a role like that has a fixed term. Would be strange to have him lead a new hire process if we’re not planning on renewing his contract, although wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if we let that happen and end up with a new Sporting Director who doesn’t get on with whichever Jurgen Bloggs we inevitably hire.

The only real visibility we have of Lutz is him being undermined by the appointment of a manager he didn't want. I'd rather see him fail on his own merit, as opposed to guesswork on the behind-the-scenes stuff. There is every chance that Lutz will be able to work with someone who he appoints for his style of play.