Stan Collymore: Talks with Southend over head of football operations role hit snag

Negotiations to appoint Stan Collymore as Southend United's head of football operations have hit a snag.

The 50-year-old former striker was a member of the panel that appointed Kevin Maher as head coach on Wednesday.

And Collymore has been in talks with chief executive Tom Lawrence about a formal role at Roots Hall.

In a statement, however, Collymore said the two sides were "a distance apart on roles and responsibilities" and nothing would be decided until next week.

Southend are 20th in the National League, having lost five of their past six games, leading to the sacking of former manager Phil Brown.

Earlier this month, Collymore offered to work for the Shrimpers for free in the hope of helping improve their fortunes following recent protests by supporters.

It led to him being co-opted into the group of four, also including chairman Ron Martin, Lawrence and director Gary Lockett, to choose Brown's successor.

On Thursday, Collymore posted on Twitter: "Tomorrow I'll rejoin the club that believed in me when others didn't, that felt like a family rather than an industry and sent coach loads of supporters to my England debut despite having moved on."

But in his statement, he said he wanted a "clear remit" as to what the head of football operations job will involve.

"The club and I are a distance apart on roles and responsibilities and are a distance apart on remuneration for those roles.

"For me the most important thing is the structure of the club ... in order to avoid any individual having undue influence at the club ever again. I want to protect the club at all costs."

Collymore's 15 goals in 30 appearances for the Shrimpers earned him a £2.25m transfer to Nottingham Forest, from where he moved to Liverpool in 1995 and became one of the Premier League's leading strikers. He also won three England caps.

He added: "As with all negotiations there is a back and forth with compromises on both sides so we'll revisit the situation early next week to see if we can agree a deal.

"If we can't, we can't, that's just life and certainly nothing to be sad or negative about. A new excellent CEO and three excellent coaches at the club I hope would be added to the 1992-3 survival as proof that I'm always here to help."

Southend have been relegated in each of the past two seasons, and lost their place in the English Football League after 101 years in May.

And Maher told BBC Essex: "The club is at a low point. Hopefully, this is the lowest it's going to go.

"It hurts seeing it where it is. We've got to change the culture within the club to get a good atmosphere around the place."

The former Shrimpers midfielder continued: "After years of disappointments, to think you flick a switch and it's then going to change, that probably won't be the case.

"We want it to happen, we want to hit the ground running but to do that straight away is going to be difficult."