On the heels of today's announcement about their coaching staff, FC Dallas has confirmed reports from earlier this week that Marco Ferruzzi was making a move to the club's front office. Ferruzzi has been announced as the new Director of Soccer Operations. After 14 seasons on the FCD bench as an assistant coach, Ferruzzi is stepping into a front office position.

Ferruzzi will effectively replace Technical Director Fernando Clavijo (who is either on leave or completely gone from the club depending on who is telling the story) and VP of Soccer Operations Luzi Muzzi who joined Orlando City back in December.

"Marco has been an invaluable part of the FC Dallas family for the last 15 years, and we are excited to promote him to an expanded leadership role," FC Dallas Chairman and CEO Clark Hunt said. "Marco has extensive experience in MLS - both as a coach and on the technical side - and he has played a key role in our scouting operation for many years. He will be an important member of our leadership team as we move into this next chapter, and I know he will do an outstanding job."

The San Antonio native has been an assistant for four different coaches in his career at FC Dallas. He first joined the staff under Colin Clarke and continued in that position under Steve Morrow, Schellas Hyndman, and Oscar Pareja. Ferruzzi also served as interim FC Dallas coach prior to the hire of Schellas Hyndman.

"I have worked closely with our technical staff during my time here and am excited to help build a roster that will put our team in position to compete for titles," said Ferruzzi. "I am grateful to the Hunt family, Clark and Dan, for this opportunity."

Ferruzzi holds his USSF "A" coaching license. He has served as a reserve team, pre-academy and premier team coach in the FC Dallas youth club. In 2012, Ferruzzi coached the FC Dallas Reserves, coaching the team to 6-3-1 record where they finished in second place of the MLS Reserve League's Central/Mountain Division.

3rd Degree's Take

I already mentioned this in the post about the staff hires from earlier today. But I'll repeat it here...

This too I think is a fantastic hire. Ferruzzi has always impressed me as a methodical and straight forward guy. He's been an FCD assistant coach for 14 years now, knows how the league works, and for the last few years has been handling scouting and the SuperDraft prep as well. He also speaks Spanish for sure and I think Portuguese too (for those Brazilians).

By bringing Ferruzzi and his experience on as a TD type guy, the club gets a vastly experienced sounding board for Gonzalez while not having a coach seemingly hovering over Gonzalez's shoulder reviewing every move from the touchline.

Plus FCD now gets their final two head coach candidates both in important, positive roles for the club. That's a win-win.