Newcastle United have made some big signings in the transfer market in 2022, but the arrival of Darren Eales as the club's new CEO may yet prove one of the most significant additions the Magpies make full stop. It has certainly got Newcastle's owners excited.
It is not a coincidence that all of the owners' major appointments to date have experience of working in the Premier League, as Eales did at Spurs and West Brom, but the executive's background in MLS means he can bring different ideas, too. In fact, that is what the owners wanted in the first place: a figure who was going to challenge the status quo on and off the field at a time when Newcastle are attempting to close the gap on the top six in the coming years.
Eales already has experience of upsetting the established order in MLS with Atlanta United and it is easy to forget the club were only founded in 2014 before the 49-year-old went on to leave a 'dramatic mark on American soccer' in the words of FC Cincinnati president Jeff Berding.
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"Darren is not going to do it the way of conventional wisdom because the conventional wisdom is not how he attacked the Atlanta build," he told ChronicleLive. "He had a plan. Clearly, it was a plan that had the support of his owner and he went about it in a very dogged way.
"It wasn't the plan that other expansion teams have necessarily done if you look at the success Atlanta had with bringing in Central and South American players, for example, and selling them to Europe. No one had really done it at the level that Atlanta had done it.
"I'm not suggesting that what he did at Atlanta is the same plan that he's going to do at Newcastle. All I know is when he determines what his plan is going to be, with the support of Dan Ashworth and the ownership, I'm quite confident he will be successful."
So what exactly will Eales do? Well, the responsibilities of a CEO can vary from club to club but, broadly speaking, Eales will be tasked with setting the tone at Newcastle; growing the club sustainably; driving commercial revenues; and putting the Magpies on the global stage.
There is also the small matter of helping to oversee the long-term redevelopment of the club's infrastructure, whether it is a new training ground or one day looking into expanding St James' Park, and Eales built Atlanta United from the ground up in that respect.
As well as having that priceless experience as a builder, Eales is the one figure in Newcastle's boardroom who knows what it takes to win trophies after being club president when Atlanta lifted the MLS Cup in 2018 and the US Open Cup and Campeones Cup in 2019. That 'unmatched commitment' to delivering success was what stood out to Ann Rodriguez, who worked with Eales as vice-president of business operations.
"Darren wants to win in everything at all times and I hope that's a great message for the Newcastle fans," she told ChronicleLive. "He's clever. That's important because he can find value in places where other people maybe had not seen it to get resources to leverage at a higher level, to get prospective young players.
"Newcastle bought one from us, Miguel Almiron, and not a lot of people were down in South America looking around so it's his ability to unearth talent and use resources wisely. When you mesh that with his competitive spirit, he finds a way."
You can see why Atlanta owner Arthur Blank referred to Eales as 'one of the best hires I've made in my career' - in so many ways. Blank had a customer-first mentality as co-founder of Home Depot, the largest home improvement retailer in the United States, and Eales felt similarly.
In fact, Eales had supporters very much in mind with every decision Atlanta made, whether it was including 'united' in the team name or ensuring food and drinks were fairly priced inside the Mercedes Benz Stadium. On a day to day level, the karaoke lover was a constant presence on the ground, drumming up support in pubs in Atlanta's early days and mingling with tailgating fans before games regardless of the previous result or the team's form.
Catie Griggs, who was chief business officer at Atlanta, said Eales 'lived and breathed it' as someone who understood what a football club 'should mean to a community'.
"Not only does Darren have technical knowledge about the sport itself, but he is truly passionate about learning and engaging with the fans and the way in which they want to be engaged and really investing in the communities that his club is in," she told ChronicleLive. "From a football club standpoint, you're there to win on the pitch but you're also there to serve the people who are coming and support you day in, day out. Darren is very good at keeping both those things front and centre at all times."
It may be hard to believe now, but there had previously been a misconception that sports fans in Atlanta were fickle. Outsiders regularly used the Atlanta Thrashers hockey team to illustrate this point when, in reality, supporters could do little when the franchise was sold and relocated to Winnipeg just 12 years after their NHL debut.
However, recognising that there were a lot of transplants living in Atlanta, who were from different parts of the US and supported basketball and American football sides from elsewhere, Eales sold Atlanta United as the team for the city and the response from the fans was telling. Around 31,000 supporters made season ticket deposits before Atlanta even had a head coach, major stars or a kit and the Five Stripes have consistently ranked in the top 15 clubs for attendances around the world ever since.
Eales' vision was central to that as an 'incredible strategist' who turned Atlanta United into a 'powerhouse' as Tim McDermott, the president of Philadelphia Union, explained.
"It's a club that a lot of us look at and try to emulate and say, 'Wow, look at what they have accomplished in Atlanta,'" he told ChronicleLive. "What they did on the pitch early on their history was remarkable, but I actually think what they did off the pitch was even more remarkable in being able to create just such a strong following from the people who reside in Atlanta.
"It's really interesting because Atlanta has this very unique composition of people that many of which are not from Atlanta so for them to create this energy and this place to be and have more fans coming to Atlanta United game than even an Atlanta Falcons game is just remarkable."
Atlanta, as McDermott alluded to, became the model for other MLS sides and a number of Eales' fellow executives told ChronicleLive the 49-year-old would take their calls about a range of issues, going as far to share training ground plans or advise on commercial matters. That gives another insight into Eales' character and an agent who dealt with the Atlanta president during his time in the US said he was a 'very good professional' with 'a lot of experience'.
Going back further, a player at Spurs during Eales' spell as director of football administration simply described him as 'the man in the office who was full of respect'. A former colleague at West Brom, meanwhile, said Eales was 'always highly regarded and a really friendly guy around the building' while another added the club's legal director and secretary was a 'great guy first and foremost'.
As far as Sporting Kansas City president Jake Reid is concerned, Eales is 'a guy you can plug in anywhere and he's going to have success and do it the right way'.
"Darren is humble," he told ChronicleLive. "He cares for his people. He's extremely passionate about the sport and about those involved in helping it grow. He's just easy to rally behind.
"You look at some of the people that have been at Atlanta who have gone on to other sports teams or places like Adidas. He grows individuals, which is important. He's collaborative. He wants success. He doesn't have an ego around it - he just wants it to be great both from a league and team standpoint."
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