Looking back, Paul Mitchell’s one and only sit down interview with journalists from his time at Newcastle United makes for even more fascinating reading.

If the headline-grabbing quote was that the club’s transfer policy was “not fit for purpose”, the devil was in the detail.

To ape the super clubs, the Magpies needed to have “a more diverse, wider-range scouting network”, he suggested.

A “different approach”, with “more intelligence” that was “data-driven”, was required.

It is a measure of how desperate things have been that, nearly 12 months on, you half-expect Ross Wilson – the man lined up to succeed Mitchell – to say many of the same things when he eventually gets his feet under the table.

For all the doom and gloom of a sobering transfer window, it is worth pointing out that we

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