Stuart Rose, or Baron Rose of Monewden to give the life peer his full title, is an unlikely CEO for Asda, the bum-tapping, no-nonsense Northern supermarket chain. But it’s not so much the plummy voice and dapper clothes. It’s his age. Running a major multiple is a young person’s game, requiring huge stamina. And with the best will in the world, even with the support of ex-Tesco and Ebay boss and TDR partner Rob Hattrell as his co-CEO, the former M&S and Top Shop boss is 75. So having parachuted himself in to stop the rot at Asda, Rose must be hoping to hire a CEO as quickly as possible.

But it won’t be easy. The recruitment process has been going on for far too long - four years! And the starting point for newly appointed headhunters Spencer Stuart may well be circling back to some of the many candidates with whom conversations previously took place now that owner manager Mohsin Issa is out of the picture.

So who’s in the running? Arguably the biggest issue is the non-compete: the obvious candidates from UK supermarket rivals will have to tend their gardens for 12 months. And Rose won’t want to wait that long if he can possibly help it. So he will likely need to look further afield, where non-competes won’t be such an issue. And he will have been encouraged to see Rami Baitieh’s early success in starting to turn Morrisons around.

 

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Quite a few international options with UK roots and experience can be ruled out. Per Bank, the Danish ex-Tesco boss, has just gone moving to Loblaws. The ex-Asda exec, Steven Cain retired from Coles last year.

A sensible option is someone from Walmart. And both Dirk Van Den Berghe and Lionel Desclee, the former chairman and CEO of Very Group, are available, having stood down in February and April respectively. Both have strong supermarket credentials, both have been Walmart CEOs in the past, and they could even form an interesting new partnership, a latterday Archie Norman and Allan Leighton combo if Rose is minded to hang up his boots altogether. Both are understood to have met with Asda’s private equity owners TDR in the last year.

Then again, TDR has kissed a lot of frogs in its lengthy search for an Asda CEO. There was a rumour going round a few weeks ago that Andy Clarke, the ex-Asda CEO, was set to make a dramatic return. Another candidate is Steve Murrells, the ex-Co-op CEO, now ensconced as Hilton Foods CEO. But whoever Rose picks, it’s a huge turnaround job, requiring bags of energy, enthusiasm and smarts. And this is no country for old men.

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