I remember having a conversation many years ago with a bloke who claimed he knew something about government weapons system procurement.

Not the everyday bullets and bombs kind of thing, but the top secret black programs that do not officially exist, where you have to have secret clearance to have any involvement, and where the costs are buried far away from prying eyes.

The take away from this conversation was that these things are not kept secret in order to prevent potential enemies from knowing about what was going on, but that secrecy was necessary in order to prevent taxpayers from knowing how much money was being wasted.

The reason this conversation came to mind was that it seems to me that Derby County is becoming a somewhat opaque organization, and one that does not encourage the spreading of too much news.

As an example, a few weeks ago I wrote in this column about the iPro fiasco; about how it likely cost the Rams several million pounds in lost revenue, but the club simply seemed to want to sweep it under the rug. Certainly, it did not seem as though anybody at the club was held accountable for the mess.

There is another impenetrable area I have touched on a couple of times, and which I find just a little irritating: who exactly is responsible for the club’s transfer dealings?

During the Nigel Clough and first Steve McClaren spells in charge, this did not seem to be an issue; not a lot of money was spent on bringing players in — except for perhaps George Thorne — and we all assumed that the manager or head coach was responsible for bringing in players, subject to spending limits applied by ownership.

This first seems to have changed during the summer of 2015. Paul Clement was appointed head coach on 1st of June, but instead of him spending hours watching video and eventually deciding which players he wanted brought in, there was an almost immediate blizzard of signings.

Darren Bent and Alex Pearce on the 8th, Scott Carson on the 11th, Andreas Weimann on the 18th, Chris Baird on the 19th,Tom Ince on the 3rd of July, Jason Shackell on the 23rd, Jacob Butterfield and Bradley Johnson on 1st of September. Later in the season, when the transfer window opened back up, we had Abdoul Camara on the 4th of January, and Nick Blackman on the 6th.

Many Rams fans believe that Paul Clement had little to do with bringing these players to the club; several of the signings simply happened too quickly, and a few of them did not seem to fill any particular need; especially Weimann and Blackman.

After the departure of Clement and the temporary spell in charge of Darren Wassall, we saw Nigel Pearson arrive; this time as manager not head coach. It seemed likely that Pearson would be his own man with regard to transfer dealings.

But the two major signings of the Pearson era, Matej Vydra and Ikechi Anya, both signed in late August of 2016 for a combined twelve or thirteen million pounds look to be following a depressing pattern.

Vydra is a talented player, but like Weimann and Blackman he skips around on the periphery of the action making almost no impact. He appears to fill a role that the team simply does not require at this point.

I have to wonder what sort of process could possibly have resulted in identifying Vydra as the player we need, and then signing him for so much money. Anya also is talented, and when he plays he adds value, but I am not sure that he adds four million pounds’ worth of value, or that the club really knows what to do with him.

There is the rub. These are all players who have talent, and have had success at this level, but you wonder how a manager who wants to improve his squad could have decided to spend so much money for players who do not fit into the team.

The issue becomes especially important now that the January transfer window has opened: will signings the Rams make this month be players that Steve McClaren wants in order to fill a need, or players that someone else thinks he can perhaps use? Has the club learned from past mistakes, or is the perpetrator of those mistakes still determined that his process can work?

Of course, as a privately owned operation, the Rams are not required to tell us anything about how the club is managed; I know that. But more than any other business, a football club is dependent on keeping the goodwill of its customers.

We do not need to know every detail of who does what at the club, but most fans respect McClaren’s judgment in football matters.

It will be a real change for the better if we could look at January’s signings, and agree that they look like McClaren players, and that they fill a need in the team.

Photo: Action Images

Derby County Polls