Silva's Number 2 heads to Portugal for managerial role

This is something to worry about. Joao Pedro is a massive part of the management team. Silva said himself how much he relies on Joao Pedro. He’s been with him since the start at Estoril. They were teammates and they’ve worked together at every club from Estoril to Everton.

Silva has a small team. Hugo Oliveira looks after the keepers. Goncarlo Pedro is the fitness coach. Then there’s the Benfica lab guy, the head of performance, Bruno Mendes. Silva added Antonis Lemonakis after working with him at Olympiacos and he’s head of analytics.

Which leaves Silva, JP and Pedro Conceição as the ones who actually do the proper coaching. Sure Duncan Ferguson is also a first team coach. But you can see how silva losing his trusted right hand man, friend and top lieutenant will have a big impact.

As for who will be the new assistant manager, my money is on Pedro Conceição, and I would expect an addition from Portuguese football to come in.

I wouldn’t be surprised though if JP is given a pay rise to persuade him to stay.

I thought Klopp, who relied on his assistant far more than Silva does, would have suffered following the permanent departure of his trusted lieutenant, but no, he’s gone from strength to strength. Maybe Silva can utilise this as an opportunity to get some new blood into his team and improve them as a result.

He's friends with both Brands and Silva, and his star has crashed after his disaster at Fenerbahçe. He might well accept an assistant's job in the Prem, where he was openly interested in working.

It's more than possible that this is just another way of attempting to unsettle one of the more realistic clubs with aspirations to do more than just sit there and be grateful for their lot in life – they've linked our best players with the world and his wife so now it's the turn of the coaching staff.

We'll have Brands linked to Man Utd next due to their 'crisis', board member or not, as someone has a photo of him and Frodo standing in the same terminal at Manchester Airport.

As my post above, I think this is a very important development and Silva needs to appoint someone quickly. And no, not Unsworth or some other blue, it needs to be someone on his wavelength, not a forced relationship. Can anyone think of any forced relationship that ever worked? I can’t think of any.

If Silva is the attack minded coach we may need a more defensive minded number 2.