Michael Edwards is to be appointed Liverpool’s first sporting director, a position that will see him take the lead role in transfer negotiations at Anfield.
Edwards has impressed Liverpool’s owner, Fenway Sports Group, in a variety of roles since bring brought to the club from Tottenham Hotspur in 2011 by the former director of football Damien Comolli.
He has progressed from head of performance and analysis to director of technical performance, to technical director, his current job, while being part of Liverpool’s transfer committee.
The key difference between Edwards’s responsibilities as technical and sporting director will be on transfers, where he will lead talks with agents and players. That was the duty of Liverpool’s chief executive but with Ian Ayre leaving the club next year FSG has taken the opportunity to alter the management structure. Edwards worked alongside Ayre on transfers during the summer as part of the handover.
Jürgen Klopp, the Liverpool manager, is understood to be fully supportive of the sporting director role and the appointment of Edwards. Klopp worked with a sporting director throughout his 14 years as a coach in Germany.
