The Chicago Fire are in turbulent waters right now. They haven’t made the playoffs out of a largely watered down Eastern Conference since 2011, they haven’t won a road game since 2014 and they’ve been in the conference cellar for the better part of a year. After finishing 2015 as the worst team in MLS (and it wasn’t particularly close, points-wise), they’re angling for the honor again in 2016. They currently have the fewest points in the league.

On top of all that, club GM Nelson Rodriguez was forced to address the sparse crowd before last weekend’s home match against the New York Red Bulls over egregious use of That Certain Chant.

So things have been better.

With all that first team turmoil you’d probably expect the academy to be in shambles. It’s not, really, although it could be better. The Fire added an impressive trophy to the mantle in 2015 when they shocked a record-setting Real Salt Lake side in the U18 Development Academy title game, revealing a surprisingly stout engine under the hood. This year, both the U16 and U18 teams made the playoffs and compiled an aggregate record of 30-12-8. Hardly embarrassing.

What’s more, the Fire have a few impressive Homegrown candidates in the pipeline, none more promising than former U17 MNT residency midfielder Cameron Lindley. The versatile midfielder is the No. 9 player in the 2016 class and the top-rated player in the country headed to college in the fall (North Carolina). The fact that he didn’t sign overseas – yet, anyway – is big news for the Fire. If they’re paying attention, a Homegrown contract shouldn’t be far off in the distance.

In any case, that’s all to say that there are certainly worse-off MLS academies than the talent churn in Chicago. And they might’ve just gotten a boost from abroad.

On Monday, Culture PSG, an unofficial Paris Saint Germain news site, reported that PSG academy technical director Cedric Cattenoy is leaving the club after 15 years to join the Fire. According to the report, Cattenoy is joining on to be the academy director hot on the heels of a firestorm of turnover in the club’s academy front office.

As @FireConf said, Gonzalo Segares has resigned as a #cf97 academy coach. And he’s not the only one departing the academy. — Orrin Schwarz (@Orrin_Schwarz) August 1, 2016

Segares was followed by others, namely academy managing director John Dorn, who’d been with the club for 15 years. The Fire had already been trying to replace former academy director Larry Sunderland, who left last winter to take over the Portland Timbers’ academy. Cattenoy, it would appear, is their answer.

The Frenchman may not be intimately familiar with the American soccer landscape, but there’s evidence he has an idea what he’s stepping into. As PSG academy technical director, he oversaw the club’s expansion into the States with academy branches opening in New York and Miami. In fact, he was in Miami as recently as earlier this year in that capacity to oversee the program’s establishment.

Cattenoy’s appointment is especially interesting in the context of the Chicago market. The Fire’s largest club competition in the sprawling city is undoubtedly the Chicago Magic, which has carried a PSG affiliation for several years now. The Magic play in PSG kits, have historically had a French coach or two and have begun producing more highly coveted pro prospects than anyone in the city. The Fire have arguably never pushed out players as highly regarded as forwards Andrija Novakovich or Emmanuel Sabbi, both of whom emerged from the Magic’s vaults in just the last two years.

Cattenoy’s appointment after spending time in one of the most talent-rich academies in the world may or may not ultimately change that paradigm. But it’ll certainly make things interesting.