RSL owner Hansen promotes Waibel to GM, Zarkos to VP


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SANDY — Real Salt Lake owner Dell Loy Hansen promoted technical director Craig Waibel to general manager and named USL Monarchs president Rob Zarkos as the team's vice president of soccer administration in an expansion of the club's soccer operations, the club announced Thursday.

The move, which comes just over a week after former president Bill Manning parted ways with RSL, is an attempt to integrate the RSL first team needs with player development at the third-division USL and academy levels. The restructuring will also develop a scouting network and implement data analytics by the staff, according to the club's announcement.

"I'm very appreciative of the communication and responsibility that Mr. Hansen is willing to invest in the entire Real Salt Lake soccer hierarchy," Waibel said in a statement. "Expanding the opportunity and ability on the team side to compete in the MLS arms race requires short-term expertise and long-term planning.

"I am very confident RSL fans will be rewarded as we re-engineer the team operations to focus our discipline, adapt to a new world and position the Claret-and-Cobalt for perennial success."

The duo will also work with current RSL assistant general manager Elliot Fall, a Salt Lake City native and graduate of the University of Utah, in the desired integration.

Waibel joined RSL in 2014 as an assistant coach and moved over to technical director in December when former general manager Garth Lagerwey accepted a similar position with the Seattle Sounders. The 40-year-old former defender of 11 seasons in MLS won four MLS Cup titles with the L.A. Galaxy, San Jose Earthquakes and Houston Dynamo in a career that encompassed five teams.

Photo: Scott G Winterton, Deseret News
Photo: Scott G Winterton, Deseret News

The 40-year-old former RSL assistant also coached three seasons in college, first with Michigan and then with Washington in 2012-13. At RSL, he was responsible for coaching the club's defenders, and also in acquiring the rights to current designated player Juan Manuel Martinez and midfielder Luis Silva.

Zarkos joined the RSL organization in September 2014 as president of the third-division Real Monarchs. A lawyer by trade, Zarkos worked with Hansen as vice president of operations and in-house counsel for the latter's real estate business.

"With improved communication and sharing greater responsibilities across the club," Zarkos said in a statement, "our team-oriented approach is expected to pay massive dividends for the sport at all levels in the great state of Utah and across the region."

Fall has been with RSL since joining the club as a recent Utah graduate and marketing and communications intern in 2007, then working as a team administrator from 2010-14. He was promoted to assistant general manager last year, and he currently manages Major League Soccer's salary cap demands and league mechanisms, as well as immigration issues, logistics and operations affecting player movement from the club's Arizona-based academy system.

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