The Sports Guru
Liverpool have spent a year changing almost everything, and now they have changed the man who was supposed to oversee the changing. Michael Edwards, the executive Fenway Sports Group brought back to steady the whole operation, has walked away from the top football job. This covers why he has gone, what it means for who now runs Liverpool's football, and why the reason for his exit says as much about FSG's ambitions as it does about his.
Michael Edwards has stepped down as chief executive of football for Fenway Sports Group, Liverpool's owners, with his departure taking effect immediately ahead of the 2026/27 season. It is a significant loss of expertise for a club that has leaned on Edwards' judgement for the better part of a decade, and it is the latest in a run of upheavals that has reshaped Anfield from the dugout upwards. FSG framed the exit as the completion of "key strategic priorities," the polite corporate wording for a job that has reached its natural end, and Edwards himself informed the group back in autumn 2025 that he intended to leave once he felt the club was set up for the future.
The project that was quietly dropped
The stated reason is tidy, but the more revealing one sits underneath it. Edwards returned to FSG in March 2024 in large part to build a multi-club ownership network, the model that has become fashionable across European football, with the group exploring the acquisition of feeder clubs including Bordeaux, Getafe and Malaga. None of it happened. FSG shelved the expansion entirely, and the empire Edwards was hired to construct was cancelled before it was built. A man does not usually stay long once the central plank of his brief has been removed, and for all the talk of foundations laid, this is at heart an executive leaving because the job he signed up for no longer exists.
Who runs Liverpool's football now
The immediate answer is that nobody new does. FSG has not lined up a successor, and president Mike Gordon is expected to resume direct oversight of the group's football operations, a return to the hands-on role he held before Edwards came back. Day to day, Liverpool retain Julian Ward as technical director and Richard Hughes as sporting director, though even that is not settled: Hughes is in the final year of his contract and has been linked with a move to Al Hilal in Saudi Arabia, which would leave the club hunting for yet another senior football figure in short order. For a set-up that prided itself on stability and clear lines of authority, there are suddenly a lot of question marks over who actually runs the football.
The timing sharpens all of it. Edwards leaves in the middle of a rebuild he helped set in motion, having coordinated the managerial handover from Jurgen Klopp to Arne Slot in 2024 and then, when that soured, the switch to Andoni Iraola this summer. Liverpool won their 20th league title under Slot in 2025 before a wretched second season ended his reign, and the club now has a new head coach, a possible new sporting director, a restored owner-president in charge of football, and the small matter of replacing Mohamed Salah. Into that, the loss of the most experienced football executive in the building is not the news a nervous fanbase wanted.
Verdict: a big departure at an awkward moment
None of this erases what Edwards did. His first spell, from 2011 to 2022, built the recruitment machine that underpinned the finest years of the Klopp era, the signings and the data-led approach that turned Liverpool from contenders into champions and delivered the 2019/20 title. He came back as the safe pair of hands, the man who had done it before and could do it again, and his own parting words were determinedly upbeat. "I leave believing Liverpool is in a strong position, with outstanding people, a clear direction and the foundations in place for continued success," he said, which is exactly what a departing executive is supposed to say.
The harder reading is that Liverpool are losing a proven operator at the precise moment they can least afford the uncertainty. A club that has just sacked a title-winning coach, appointed his replacement, and faces losing both its talisman and possibly its sporting director does not obviously benefit from also waving off the executive meant to hold it all together. FSG will argue that the structure was always bigger than one man, and they may be proved right. But this is a summer of subtraction at Anfield, and Edwards is the biggest name yet to be subtracted from it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Edwards has stepped down as FSG's chief executive of football with immediate effect, having told the group in autumn 2025 that he intended to leave once he felt Liverpool were set up for the future. FSG described it as the completion of key strategic priorities, though a major factor was the shelving of the multi-club ownership model he had returned to build.
Edwards returned to FSG in March 2024 in large part to develop a multi-club network, with the group exploring the purchase of feeder clubs including Bordeaux, Getafe and Malaga. FSG ultimately shelved the expansion plans, removing the central part of the brief that had tempted Edwards back.
No successor has been appointed. FSG president Mike Gordon is expected to resume direct oversight of football operations. Julian Ward remains technical director and Richard Hughes sporting director, though Hughes is in the final year of his contract and has been linked with a move to Al Hilal.
Edwards served two spells, from 2011 to 2022 and then as FSG's football CEO from 2024. In his first stint he built the recruitment operation behind Liverpool's success under Jurgen Klopp, including the 2019/20 Premier League title, before returning to oversee the managerial transitions to Arne Slot and then Andoni Iraola.
Sources: Reporting from Sky Sports, corroborated by ESPN, This Is Anfield and other outlets covering Fenway Sports Group.
