Swansea City plan to name Steve Cooper as their new manager within the next 48 hours.
The 39-year-old England U17 World Cup-winning and former Liverpool academy chief has beaten others on the club’s shortlist that included their own academy manager, Cameron Toshack.
Cooper is still currently employed by the FA and has never managed a team at senior level.
The Swans have taken their time in replacing Graham Potter, who left to join Premier League Brighton last month.
They wanted to find another young, progressive coach who reflected their own ambitions to play a fluid passing game and rely on home-reared youngsters in the current rebuilding process and believe in Cooper they have found their man.
Michael Appleton, Gus Poyet and Albert Stuivenberg were also considered during an extensive interview process, but in Cooper the Swans chairman Trevor Birch believes he has the nearest thing to a like-for-like replacement for Potter.
The one, obvious difference is that Cooper has never managed at senior club level, unlike Potter who had extensive experience in Sweden.
Cooper, who was born in Pontypridd, is the son of former top referee Keith Cooper, who took charge of both Premier League and European matches.
Steve began his playing career at Wrexham but later went on to play at semi-professional level for The New Saints, Rhyl and Bangor City.
He turned to coaching at an early age and gained his Pro Licence at just 27.
He then coached at youth level back at Wrexham before moving to Liverpool where he worked his way up to become academy head coach in 2011.
Those players he worked with Anfield included current England stars Raheem Sterling and Trent Alexander-Arnold.
Cooper then joined the Football Association in 2013 as a youth coach educator and a year later he took over England’s U16 side.
He replaced John Peacock as U17 head coach in 2015 and went on to lead the Young Lions to World Cup glory in India in 2017.
Both Jadon Sancho and Phil Foden were part of the side that lifted the trophy.
