Chelsea have poached another key figure at Brighton & Hove Albion after agreeing a deal to appoint Sam Jewell to a senior role in their recruitment team.
Jewell resigned as Brighton's head of recruitment, a role he landed when Paul Winstanley left for Stamford Bridge 16 months ago, and is expected to serve his notice period before starting his new role in November.
The 34-year-old was tempted to take on a new challenge after being offered a global role in Chelsea's multi-club operation. Chelsea have made sweeping internal changes since being bought by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital in 2022 and are keen to build the operation around their co-sporting directors, Winstanley and Laurence Stewart.
Jewell's move comes as Chelsea await the arrival of Josh Marsh as their new loan manager. Chelsea have focused on buying young players in the last 12 months and, although results have been inconsistent, they believe the strategy overseen by Winstanley and Stewart will pay dividends in the long term.
A key ambition is to add more data-driven exploration and strengthen the analytics department. In that sense, it is not surprising that Chelsea have turned to the Brighton model. Brighton have repeatedly outperformed their chances thanks to smart recruitment.
Chelsea have recruited several people from Brighton. Graham Potter left Brighton to become Chelsea manager in September 2022 and brought in his backroom staff. potter was fired in April 2023 but some members of his technical team stayed at Chelsea. Kyle Macaulay remained in a recruiting position and Ben Roberts remained as goalkeeping coach. Roberts was key in Chelsea signing goalkeeper Djordje Petrovic last summer.
Brighton have made a lot of money with Chelsea. They have been sold by Marc Cucurella, Moisés Caicedo and Robert Sánchez in the last two years.
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Jewell, son of former Wigan Athletic and Bradford City manager Paul, helped Caicedo move to Brighton, who sold the Ecuadorian midfielder for £115m last summer. He also helped track down Argentine midfielder Alexis Mac Allister. His responsibilities at Brighton will be assumed by the club's assistant manager, Mike Cave, and director of scouting and intelligence, George Holmes.
