Few of the recent headlines around Melbourne Victory have been positive, prompting the question: Is this a club in crisis? For so long a rock of stability amid an ocean of turbulence, Victory has found itself in choppy waters, with plenty queuing up to ask whether its vaunted stability, when it was tightly controlled by Lord - its founding chairman - is a thing of the past. With a new managing director - former board member and investor Richard Wilson - replacing Miles, and a new chairman-elect, Anthony Di Pietro, looking to bed themselves in, the last thing they needed was the negative publicity of Muscat's brutal assault on Heart's Adrian Zahra in the Melbourne derby last month. After which they had to fend off questions about the club's culture and the way it operates on the field. Lord is stepping down at the end of the season after six years in charge. He has cited business pressures as a key reason but will remain on the board with the title of founding chairman. Lord has reduced his shareholding in the club to about 15 per cent. He is yet to decide whether to sell out completely. Di Pietro has been on the board for five years and says the baton change is evolution, not revolution.

While the board composition has changed from the small group that controlled affairs in Lord's heyday - businessmen Harry Stamoulis and Peter Anastasiasou have now become members - Di Pietro scoffs at scuttlebutt that the club is lurching back into old soccer days, with falling crowds and a revolving door of personnel in key positions. ''That's just not the case at all, and while there has been a lot of change here in a short time, it's not about revolution or change for its own sake,'' he says. ''It's a smooth transition at board level. Geoff is the founding chairman. I have been on the board here for five years and was unanimously elected his successor. If there was any dissent or splits, that wouldn't have been the case.'' Di Pietro also points out that many of the board members - men like Lord confidants Ron Peck and John Harris, and Mario Biaisin and Wilson - have been on the board for several years to back his assertion that despite how it might look from the outside, the club is inherently stable. Wilson, he adds, was an obvious choice as managing director. Having been an investor, he had ''skin'' in the game, and has a large business network in Melbourne. The club was also taking the initiative on appeasing disgruntled supporters. Di Pietro, Wilson and other executives, along with Muscat, met fans earlier this week to hear their grievances and will take up the issues with AAMI Park management and Football Federation Australia.

Wilson echoes Di Pietro on the need for stability. ''Sometimes things happen and people look for things in them,'' he says. ''Geoff [Miles] had been here for five years, and there are many who believe that as a CEO that's probably about as long as you can do in one job. We are all on the same page here and are determined to build the club up further.'' Lord will now concentrate on business development and strategy for the club. He is particularly proud of the way the club has tapped into Melbourne's corporate sector through its Victory in Business lunches and functions, and believes he can extend that while also looking at other sports business activities. ''It's the end of one chapter and in another way the opening of a different one,'' he says. ''It also makes me available to do other soccer or sporting things that come up. I love sport, and I am proud of what I have built, but it's the end of a chapter.'' Loading Di Pietro says the club is looking to its Asian Champions League campaign to explore further business opportunities in Asia. He and Wilson, along with sales manager Jim Christo, attended the recent Soccerex conference in Singapore where they met with executives from Liverpool and Chelsea whom they hope - long term - to attract to Melbourne for a pre-season match.

A key to Victory's on-field success has been the lack of volatility in the soccer department, with coach Ernie Merrick, soccer operations chief Gary Cole, and his assistant, Aaron Healy, all having worked together since the club's inception. Di Pietro says there are no plans for changes, with Merrick contracted for another season. ''Ernie's record speaks for itself and we are comfortable with him. He's accountable, like everyone else.''