Plymouth Argyle: What has gone wrong at struggling League One side?

Wayne Rooney. The former England captain turned the spotlight on Home Park in the summer of 2024 when he was named as Foster’s permanent successor.

That was despite having a torrid spell as Birmingham City boss the season before as they went from a play-off place to finishing a point behind the Pilgrims in the final relegation spot.

He won just four games and left on New Year’s Eve as a club that had been hailed for their foresight and strategic thinking was castigated for what some felt was being spellbound by the lure of a big name and the prospect of a Netflix-style documentary that could propel the club to a worldwide audience.

“I think the last two or three years has really showed them reacting to situations rather than being proactive,” says BBC Radio Devon’s Alan Richardson, who has covered the club for more than 20 years across all three tiers of the EFL.

Since the start of this year Argyle have had two directors of football, are on to their second chief executive, brought in their first head of football operations and are looking for their third head of recruitment after Tom Randle left last month.

“Randle was someone Miron Muslic (Wayne Rooney’s successor as head coach) had worked with at Bruges, and then it didn’t work so the new head coach Tom Cleverley suddenly had a head of recruitment he wasn’t particularly familiar with,” adds Richardson.

“Neil Dewsnip (director of football) left, he was replaced by David Fox who had done well in a similar sort of role at Huddersfield but is not hugely experienced and the arrival of Derek Adams causes, in some ways from the outside in at least, quite a bit of confusion because who’s doing what, who’s reporting to who, who’s in ultimate control?”

Former Pilgrims boss Adams returned to Home Park last week as director of football in the latest behind the scenes change.

“It’s an interesting one,” says Richardson, who covered the reign of Adams as Argyle boss from 2015 to 2019 which saw them win promotion to League One before relegation back to the fourth tier.

“Derek brings a large wealth of experience, he knows Argyle inside out, he loves the club, the club largely love him, so from that point of view it makes absolute sense.

“But who exactly is going to be doing what is the thing that I’m waiting to see.”