Leeds United set to name Gretar Steinsson in senior recruitment role - The Athletic 17/7/23
By Phil Hay
Leeds United are set to appoint outgoing Tottenham Hotspur
performance director Gretar Steinsson to a senior recruitment role at Elland
Road.
Steinsson, who was due to leave Spurs this summer, has
accepted a high-level technical post at Leeds as part of restructuring in the
aftermath of the departure of United’s former director of football, Victor
Orta.
Orta left Leeds in May after almost six years in that job,
parting ways with Leeds ahead of the club’s relegation from the Premier League.
Leeds subsequently enlisted former Reading director of
football Nick Hammond on a short-term basis to oversee their transfer business
in this summer window.
The club originally intended to make a permanent appointment
to replace Orta once the window closed, saying on the day of Hammond’s arrival
that “the process for finding a new permanent director of football is under way
and the club aim to complete this process by October, allowing the successful
candidate to focus on the January transfer window”.
Steinsson’s imminent arrival in a prominent technical
position brings forward the timeframe for filling the hole created by Orta’s
exit, although it is not yet clear what title the former Bolton Wanderers
director will officially be given.
Leeds have been discussing widening their football
operations team to avoid responsibility for it resting with one person, as it
did with Orta from 2017 onwards.
Steinsson, who retired from playing in 2013, has previously
held jobs as technical director of Fleetwood Town and head of recruitment and
development at Everton.
Spurs took him on as performance director a year ago in a
position which covered both the first team and the academy but it was revealed
last month that he would be parting company with the North London side before
the start of the new season.
‘He is like a pit bull’
Analysis by Spurs correspondent Charlie Eccleshare
Steinsson is known for his honesty, his straightforwardness,
his utter contempt for bullshit.
Be that with agents, who generally appreciate his direct
approach, or colleagues he does not feel are up to scratch.
His great friend and former colleague Marcel Brands, who
hired Steinsson as his de facto deputy while Everton’s director of football,
has said of him: “He’s like a pit bull — if he sees something and wants
something, he goes for it.”
