The Houston Dynamo have just announced the hiring of Matt Jordan as their Vice-President/General Manager. Jordan previously held the Technical Director spot for the Montreal Impact. He had been a part of the Impact’s technical staff for the past 4 years.

At first glance he may be an under-whelming signing that does not turn many heads, however, his experience as a person that has worked within the confines of Major League Soccer should not be overlooked. Even though it would have made more of an impact to hire a person with more name recognition, that name recognition could have come at the expense of not knowing the quirks that Major League Soccer has.

Jordan’s job will involve salary cap management, contract negotiations, scouting, and overlooking the technical budget. All of these are aspects that he has experience in dealing with while working as technical director for Montreal. He also helped Montreal launch the Impact’s USL-Pro team that will debut in 2015. This is without a doubt a reason why he was hired since the Houston Dynamo hope to also launch a team in 2016. Jordan will come into the job with that experience already in hand.

Houston Dynamo fans in the past have complained about the lack of foreign signings that the team has made in the past, or at the very least the lack of “big name” foreign signings. While working in Montreal, Jordan was critical in helping the team sign Marco Di Vaio and Alessandro Nesta, both players had at one time played in Italy’s Serie A for teams such as Juventus, Milan, and Lazio. Nesta was also a part of the World Cup winning Italian team from 2006.

These types of signings and experience should be something that the Houston Dynamo fan base should look forward to. However, the most important aspect of his job will probably be the creation of an international scouting network. His success with the team will be more dependent on this than anything else. If Jordan is capable of setting up a scouting network that brings young talent and international signings to the team then his tenure will end up being a success, if the opposite happens it could probably be labeled as a mistake.