High-ranking Leeds United figure 'set to join' Premier League side Everton — YEP 26/2/25
By Kyle Newbould
Leeds United's 2024/25 Championship season will be overseen
before the reported switch.
Angus Kinnear could be set to leave Leeds United this summer
with reports suggesting he is closing in on a move to Everton.
Kinnear was first named as a possible target for incoming
Everton owners, The Friedkin Group (TFG) last week, with a recruitment agency
shortlisting Leeds’ chief executive to fill a similar role on Merseyside.
Long-serving club employee Colin Chong has filled the CEO
role on a temporary basis for almost two years following Denise
Barrett-Baxendale's exit, with a more permanent appointment planned for this
summer.
The Daily Mail now claim Kinnear looks set to fill that
role, having been identified at the ‘number one candidate’ by new-look American
owners TFG, therefore calling time on an eight-year period.
The 47-year-old is expected to see out the current campaign
with Leeds first and foremost, with a desire to oversee promotion and end on a
high before he moves on to pastures new.
Kinnear joined Leeds back in 2017, having previously spent
four years at West Ham and a decade as commercial director at Arsenal during a
period in which they moved from Highbury to the Emirates Stadium.
He is the one of very few high-ranking figures still at
Elland Road from Andrea Radrizzani’s tenure as owner, another being head of
football operations Adam Underwood, having kept his role during the 2023
takeover by 49ers Enterprises.
The CEO is said to have an ‘open-ended contract’ at Leeds
with talks set to take place between both clubs over his switch from West
Yorkshire to Merseyside.
But Kinnear is said to be closing in on securing that move,
with a busy summer on the horizon as Everton move from Goodison Park to
Bramley-Moore Dock while also investing in an under-performing squad, with the
financial freedom to spend for the first time in several years.
Leeds have declined to comment on the development and
following last week’s initial links, a club spokesperson told the YEP all
efforts are being directed towards promotion.