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0 shares 11 View comments Running a football club is like building a house in a hurricane. Put one wall up and the roof blows off. Fit a new door and the television flies through the window. It's almost impossible to make plans. People in the game talk of establishing foundations and 'long-term objectives', but we live in a world afflicted by attention deficit disorder, a world where the phrase 'long term' refers to a time span somewhere between the career of an X Factor winner and the life of a mayfly. Players and managers come and go with dizzying regularity, but a few not only set out their masterplan but also cling to it with a grim determination even when crucial parts are being swept away by the wind. Charismatic: Swansea manager Michael Laudrup could be persuaded to leave the Libert Stadium     More from Des Kelly...

0 shares 26 View comments Chelsea supporters can boo as loudly as they like on Saturday — they’ve paid their money after all. But the first thing to say is that pretty much everything Rafa Benitez said was right. He was undermined at Chelsea from day one by the bizarre decision to invite him to take charge, only to chop his legs away with the title of Interim Manager. Benitez said it was a ‘massive mistake’. So did we all. Speaking out: Benitez caused a storm on Wednesday night when he gave his take on the goings on at Chelsea     More from Des Kelly...   DES KELLY: Well, nothing lasts forever... it's been a blast! Sportsmail's brilliant columnist bows out after almost a decade at the top 31/05/13   Des Kelly: When it came to the most important tick of his career clock, S

0 shares 173 View comments The moment the supremely accomplished British footballer Gareth Bale falls over an imaginary leg during a match, it sparks outbreaks of copycat behaviour right across the land. Not on our football pitches, but in the nation's television studios and press boxes as pundits trip over themselves, too, in a desperate hunt to find excuses for the player’s behaviour. Rather than condemn Bale as  a cheat and a diver, every euphemism in the lexicon of Footballspeak is dutifully offered up in an attempt to excuse his deeds. Falling down (again): Gareth Bale was booked for this dive against Inter Milan on Thursday night     More from Des Kelly...   DES KELLY: Well, nothing lasts forever... it's been a blast! Sportsmail's brilliant columnist bows out after almost a decade at the top

0 shares 48 View comments English football is in crisis. Just look at the failure of this nation’s clubs in the Champions League. The statistics are damning. They show that no Premier League side has won the competition in a dismal run of failure stretching back to… er, what is it now? Oh, yes — 10 whole months. No club from this country has been crowned champions of Europe since last May. What a shocking indictment that is. Some will try to gloss over this demise by pointing out there hasn’t been a final since last May. But failure is failure. We can only shake our heads and wonder where that long-lost golden age of 43 weeks ago has gone to. Those heady days when we were still unable to leave the front door unlocked, a pint of beer was about the same price as it is now and we had complete faith in our game. When did it all change? Not so bad: It is just 10 months since Chelsea were crowned kings of Europe

0 shares 123 View comments Dear West Ham Could you please send me the part of the Olympic stadium that I now own? It seems the Government has given you millions of pounds of public money and, as a result, I have bought a piece of your new arena. I’d like that back, thank you. Can you believe it? British taxpayers have just handed a Premier League football club a stadium worth half a billion pounds which, in these austere times, you might think is charity enough. But not content with that almighty handout, the Government is throwing another £25million of public money in their direction to ensure the interior fittings, including new seats and a roof, are to their liking when they move into their gigantic new council house. New home: An artist's impression of how the Olympic Stadium will look when West Ham move in     More from Des Kelly...

20 shares 34 View comments In all the debate about whether he is an outright fascist or a misunderstood eccentric, one significant question appears to have been lost in the pseudo-political fog. Is Paolo Di Canio any good at his job? Everyone has been so busy wondering if he goosesteps up and down his hallway that they have ignored the more pragmatic concern that he could march Sunderland straight through the Premier League trapdoor. Di Canio may indeed adore Benito Mussolini. He might even strike a quick, straight-arm salute when he catches sight of himself in the mirror. Who knows? Getting shirty: Di Canio is unveiled at Sunderland earlier this week The day job: The Italian oversees his first Sunderland training session     More from Des Kelly...   DES KELLY: Well, nothing lasts forever... it's been a