Sheffield Wednesday's transformation under new ownership isn't limited to what supporters can see on the pitch.
While Henrik Pedersen prepares his squad for the League One campaign, another rebuild is taking place behind the scenes at Hillsborough.
People are leaving. New faces are arriving. Responsibilities are changing.
And in the case of long-serving general manager Alastair Wilson, his departure perhaps encapsulates one of the more difficult questions facing the new owners.
How much of the old Wednesday should be retained while trying to build something fundamentally different?
Fifteen years at Hillsborough
The Sheffield Star's Alex Miller and Liam Norcliffe report that Wilson is set to leave Wednesday after 15 years at the club, ending an association that began when Milan Mandaric brought him to Hillsborough in 2011.
Wilson became general manager in 2023 following Liam Dooley's departure and assumed responsibility for the club's commercial and operational functions.
His departure comes after an extraordinary final period under Dejphon Chansiri.
The Star reports that Wilson was among a small number of senior employees who helped keep Wednesday functioning as the previous ownership unravelled, using long-established relationships with suppliers and contractors while the club battled severe financial and operational problems.
His work alongside others in resolving the problems surrounding the North Stand roof was particularly significant, helping avoid the prospect of the stand remaining closed for an extended period.
The Star also reports that Wilson turned down approaches from other employers during those difficult final months, choosing to remain at Hillsborough and see the situation through.
That deserves recognition.
But it isn't the entirety of the story.
Two very different views
There is clearly significant affection for Wilson among some of the people who worked with him and supporters he helped.
Wednesday supporter MattTyper1 provided a particularly personal account on X following news of his departure.
He described an understaffed operation in which Wilson and others routinely appeared to perform responsibilities far beyond their defined roles.
One anecdote is particularly telling.
During a very short walk towards the lift opposite Hillsborough's directors' entrance, Matt recalled Wilson being stopped several times by supporters thanking him for things he had personally helped resolve. One involved tickets, another travel.
Matt also described Wilson supporting him personally during a difficult moment and portrayed a man whose public reputation didn't always reflect the person he had encountered behind the scenes.
But there is another view among sections of the Wednesday fanbase.
For some supporters, Wilson's senior position during the Chansiri years inevitably associates him with an administration they are desperate to leave behind.
There have also been critical accounts from supporters concerning interactions with the club, including complaints surrounding accessibility and the use of facilities at Hillsborough by people dealing with illness or disability.
We are not in a position to adjudicate individual accounts or establish the circumstances surrounding every decision made during that period.
A football club in crisis can produce both things simultaneously: employees working exceptionally hard in extraordinarily difficult circumstances, and supporters having experiences that they consider unacceptable.
One does not automatically invalidate the other.
Nor is it necessarily fair to assume that somebody who remained in a senior position under Chansiri endorsed every decision made by the former chairman.
But equally, supporters are entitled to question the culture and decision-making of the organisation that existed beneath him.
Wednesday cannot genuinely claim to have changed simply because the name above the door has changed.
Sometimes moving forward requires moving on
Perhaps that is ultimately why Wilson's departure feels like the right outcome.
Not because his 15 years of service should be dismissed.
Not because positive accounts of his character should be ignored.
And certainly not because everything that went wrong at Sheffield Wednesday under Dejphon Chansiri can reasonably be attributed to the people who worked beneath him.
It can't.
But David Storch and Arise Capital Partners aren't simply repairing the previous version of Sheffield Wednesday.
They're trying to create a different one.
David Bruce has arrived as chief executive officer, Simon Wilson as sporting director and Oscar Chamberlain as brand director, with further additions to the workforce expected.
Those appointments aren't just names on an organisational chart. They are the beginnings of a new
For too long Wednesday appeared dependent on a relatively small number of individuals taking on multiple responsibilities and somehow keeping the machine running.
There is something admirable about employees stepping up when circumstances demand it.
There is nothing admirable about an organisation being structured so poorly that they continually have to.
The objective now must be to build a football club where extraordinary individual effort isn't required to achieve ordinary functionality.
That requires more people, clearer accountability and specialist expertise.
It may also require fresh voices.
Change on the football side too
The transition is visible within Henrik Pedersen's operation as well.
The Wednesday Word's Joe Crann reported ahead of the Carabao Cup victory over Bolton Wanderers that first-team coach Craig Mudd had completed a return to Manchester City.
Mudd had already missed Wednesday's pre-season trips to Hungary and Austria after attracting interest from his former club.
Rather than immediately filling the vacancy, Pedersen used the opportunity to assess his existing staff and identify what his coaching group actually required.
The Star has since reported that former Wednesday midfielder and Rotherham United manager Matt Hamshaw has held talks about joining the club.
Hamshaw would return to Hillsborough more than two decades after leaving as a player, having been part of Wednesday's 2005 League One play-off winning squad.
He also brings something particularly relevant to the current challenge: extensive experience of winning promotion from League One.
The 44-year-old has been involved in four promotions from the division during his coaching career with Rotherham United and Derby County.
Pedersen told The Star that he had spoken with a number of coaches before identifying what he believes to be the right profile and personality for his staff.
Rather than simply replacing somebody who left, Wednesday appear to be asking what the new version of the club actually needs.
Build, don't preserve
There is a temptation after everything Sheffield Wednesday has endured to become sentimental about the people who helped the club survive it.
And gratitude is entirely appropriate.
Wilson and numerous other employees worked through circumstances that no properly functioning football club should have allowed to develop.
There will almost certainly be stories from inside those final Chansiri years that supporters have never heard.
Some may dramatically alter perceptions of individuals who were working at Hillsborough at the time.
But gratitude doesn't have to mean preservation.
Arise have inherited an enormous rebuilding job, and their task isn't to recreate the Sheffield Wednesday that existed before the crisis.
It is to build something better.
That means establishing their own standards, their own expectations and their own culture.
Some people from the previous regime will undoubtedly help accelerate that process.
Others may not.
That doesn't automatically make them bad people, bad employees or responsible for what came before.
Sometimes an organisation simply reaches the point where a clean break is beneficial to everyone involved.
After 15 years, Wilson can leave Sheffield Wednesday with legitimate recognition for the work he did, particularly during some of the darkest months in the club's recent history.
Supporters who had different experiences are equally entitled to remember his tenure differently.
Both can be true.
But Wednesday's direction now has to be forward.
The most important people at Hillsborough over the coming years won't necessarily be those who were best equipped to help the club survive the old regime.
They will be the people capable of accelerating what comes next.
[Image credit to SWFC Official]