Gretar Steinsson Tottenham
Tottenham Hotspur have moved to strengthen their backroom operation before the new season by appointing Gretar Steinsson to a new role as performance director, The Athletic understands.
Steinsson, a former Iceland international who represented Bolton during his playing career, has previously worked at Everton as their head of recruitment before he left in December after three years in the position.
Gretar Steinsson role at Tottenham.
Gretar Steinsson will reportedly be appointed as a Performance Director at Tottenham, with Fabio Paratici looking to overhaul the scouting and youth recruitment at Spurs this summer.
Ex-Iceland international Steinsson has a strong reputation in the game and will bolster the Spurs set-up following Steve Hitchen’s departure from the job of technical performance director.
Steinsson is expected to have a wide remit across senior and youth levels at the north London club and work closely with managing director of football Fabio Paratici.
Steinsson will begin the newly-created role, which sees him reporting into managing director of football Fabio Paratici, a week today, July 1, and arrives at Spurs with a very good reputation.
Who’s Gretar Steinsson?
Steinsson’s playing career is largely remembered for his four years at Bolton, for whom he scored against Tottenham in a 4-2 win in November 2010.
Bolton bought him in January 2008 from AZ Alkmaar in the Netherlands, where he was signed from Swiss side Young Boys by his future mentor and friend Brands (then Alkmaar’s director of football). He also won 46 caps for Iceland.
After having to retire aged 31 in 2013 because of injury, Steinsson completed a postgraduate degree in football management at the Johan Cruyff Institute in the Netherlands.
He has a background in sports psychology, and while studying visited numerous clubs (including another meeting with Brands at Dutch side PSV Eindhoven), built his network of contacts and immersed himself in elements of football such as data analytics. Even as a player, he took an interest in these aspects of the game.
Two years after his playing career ended, he became third-tier Fleetwood’s sporting director before being hired by Brands to join north west neighbours Everton in December 2018.
Steinsson Breakthrough.
At Fleetwood, Steinsson’s transfer successes meant he was largely given free rein.
In his second season, Fleetwood finished fourth in League One despite having one of the smallest budgets. They signed players of a calibre that had seemed unimaginable before his arrival. Players came in from Manchester City, Liverpool and Everton, while Lewie Coyle was highly rated at Leeds United when he was signed on loan in 2017.
Steinsson’s connections saw Fleetwood tour the Netherlands in the pre-season of 2016 — a trip including a game against Alkmaar, one of his former teams.
What exactly will Gretar Steinsson bring to Tottenham?
Steinsson is known for his honesty, his straightforwardness, his utter contempt for bullshit.
He will be involved in such areas as scouting, recruitment and sports science with the first team and academy.
“At Everton, Gretar was involved in the whole structure of the club, not just the first team,” according to Brands(one of many colleagues) as reported by The Athletic.
“He was very involved in scouting but also in the first team and under-23s — he was at the games, he was at the youth academy.
“That’s a good sign because a lot of people only want to be involved with the first team. But he knew everything was important.”
“He’s a guy that you can absolutely trust and rely on, who wants to work day and night.”
“Spurs will be very happy with him; they have someone who will work his arse off,” Brands said.
“Someone you can rely on, who will work day and night for the club. He will do the best things he can for the club. You have a very committed person who will make every effort in every part of the club — academy, first team, under-23s, you name it.
“Working three years with him, he never disappointed me.”
Conclusion.
Personally, I believe Steinsson will be a great appointment for Spurs, not only to lower the workload for Fabio Paratici, but also to allow the club to work on numerous signings at once as Tottenham enter one of the biggest summers in their illustrious history.
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