Chelsea have confirmed that Marina Granovskaia will step down from her role as director of the club at the culmination of the summer transfer window. The 47-year-old follows Bruce Buck standing down as the Blues' chairman earlier in the week. Co-owner Todd Boehly will take Buck's place as Chairman of the board.
The Russian-Canadian businesswoman was still speaking to representatives of players as recently as last week and has been Chelsea's figurehead for transfers, contracts and sponsorship deals for a number of years. However, new co-owner Boehly is said to have led talks over the departure of Romelu Lukaku. Among the American's first challenges will be to form a good relationship with Thomas Tuchel who has repeatedly spoken highly of his dealings with Granovskaia and Petr Cech.
Granovskaia is said to have helped orchestrate Chelsea move to their current training facility at Cobham, which has heralded a number of stars from the academy. After becoming Roman Abramovich's representative at the club in 2010, Granovskaia joined Chelsea's board in 2013 before being promoted to chief executive the following year.
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In her time as director of the club she received the award for Best Club Director in European football at the Golden Boy Awards in 2021.
"We thank Marina for her many years of excellent service to the Club and wish her all the best in her future ventures," Boehly wrote in the statement on the club's official website.
There have been a raft of new names added to the board in a shakeup to how the club will be run from the 2022-23 campaign onwards. Joining Boehly on the board are many of the American's co-investors including Hansjorg Wys, Mark Walter and representatives from Clearlake Capital.
News of a successor to Granvoskaia is yet to be released and will likely come later in the summer. Reports on Tuesday indicated that former Manchester United director Ed Woodward was interested in the position.
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