Chelsea are continuing their attempts to revamp the internal structure at Stamford Bridge. Todd Boehly spent most of the summer stripping the club down to its bare bones to create a new hierarchy with his and Clearlake Capital's name on it.
The Blues haven't shied away from making big decisions so far. Petr Cech, Marina Granovskaia and Bruce Buck were all gone within months of the new group arriving - that was the existing transfer structure - and then head of international scouting Scott McLachlan left shortly after alongside head physio Thierry Laurent and medical director Dr Pablo Biosca.
Thomas Tuchel was sacked just six games into the season as the shake-up went on, and now Boehly is able to start putting the new pieces in place.
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His search for a technical director appears to be over with football.london understanding that former RB Leipzig man Christopher Vivell is still expected to join the club. He will take up one role in the club's recruitment and planning, but that's not all Boehly wants. Chelsea plans to have advisors and other directors involved, including Joe Shields from Southampton - head of recruitment.
Now, the Athletic report that another senior figure is close to being added, Laurence Stewart. Currently, at Monaco, it's reported that Stewart will join the set-up in an unspecified role.
Stewart has previously worked at Everton, Manchester City and RB Leipzig and is a big advocate for using a multi-club system which Boehly is keen to implement at Stamford Bridge. He has also spent time at the FA.
Stewart has a degree in science and football from his time at University in Liverpool during the early 2000s and has spent the 20 years since involved in football in different capacities. His first job out of University was as account management at Sportsec before becoming head of performance analysis at Hull City for four years, two of which were in the Premier League.
During three years at Hull, he also worked as a performance analysis consultant to England Rugby League, eventually moving on to be head of technical analysis. He then moved to the FA during the 2014 World Cup, where he was a performance analyst again, and this seemingly helped him earn a big move to Manchester City.
One year before appointing Pep Guardiola, he was appointed head of performance analysis but left shortly after the current boss arrived, going to Everton. He was then a senior recruitment co-ordinator at Goodison Park before moving abroad to work as part of the exciting Red Bull group at RB Leipzig. As head of scouting, the German side purchased Nordi Mukiele, Matheus Cunha, Christopher Nkunku and Patrik Schick, as well as selling Naby Keita for more than £50m.
He was also promoted to head of global scouting for the Red Bull group at this stage at a time that saw Amadou Haidara, Tyler Adams, Dani Olmo, Dominik Szoboszlai and Hee-Chan Hwang come through the pathway. He left his role shortly before Vivell moved across from Salzburg to Leipzig to be technical director, this time moving to Monaco, where he was appointed head of recruitment.
At Monaco, Lawrence became technical director after one year, and their notable work with players includes buying Kevin Volland and selling Aurelien Tchouameni for £80m this summer.
Stewart will be part of what is promising to be a large machine at Chelsea, and his ability to work across multiple sectors of a football club may well help him to become a key man under Boehly.
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