WORCESTER are ready to buy Carl Hogg out of his Gloucester contract to install him as forwards coach at Sixways.
The Citizen understands the Warriors have made an official approach to Gloucester, seeking the services of former Scotland back-rower Hogg.
Worcester must now strike a compensation deal with the Cherry and Whites, to account for the final year of Hogg's Gloucester contract, before he can join Dean Ryan's Sixways overhaul.
And there is every chance a deal will be completed with little delay now.
The Gloucester coaching team are set for a two-day residential review of the season on Thursday and Friday this week.
Kingsholm rugby director Nigel Davies will be unlikely to want to gather his coaching team with one member's future potentially up for debate.
Davies is not prone to leaving his staff in difficult positions.
But it is thought that if Hogg wants to stay at Gloucester and see out his contract he can still do exactly that.
Former Gloucester boss Ryan brought Hogg to Kingsholm in 2006, and the meticulous tactician has thrived with the Cherry and Whites.
Hogg signed a three-year deal alongside then-boss Bryan Redpath in 2011, to reflect the duo's impressive work in carrying Gloucester to the Premiership play-offs and the LV=Cup triumph that term.
When Redpath's tenure collapsed spectacularly at the tail-end of last season there were plenty of suggestions that Hogg would follow him in a quick Kingsholm exit.
But new boss Davies wasted little time in assuring a place for Hogg in his revamped and extended Gloucester line-up.
Davies has tapped into Hogg's attention to detail, leaving Gloucester's squad impressed with how the former Edinburgh coach has been integrated into the new-look coaching set-up.
Hogg has remained firm friends with Ryan since his Kingsholm departure though, and he may feel the time is right for a change and a new challenge after seven years with the Cherry and Whites.
Should Hogg decide to leave then Gloucester would have plenty of options as a potential replacement.
The most obvious would be Trevor Woodman, who has left his post as Wasps' forwards coach after four years with the London club.
The former Gloucester prop spent three years as forwards coach at Sydney University after injury curtailed his glittering playing career at the age of just 29.
While at Sydney University Woodman also spent seven months as a scrum consultant for the Australian Rugby Union.
And he has continued to build his strong coaching reputation during his Wasps tenure.
Gloucester's current defence coach Paul Moriarty could just as easily switch into the forwards role too.
Either way, Davies is likely to seek a new coaching recruit should Hogg leave the Cherry and Whites.
Former Gloucester boss Ryan had always insisted he was uninterested in a full-time return to frontline coaching.
But then he took up the interim job as forwards coach with Scotland during the Six Nations.
Now he is back in the Premiership with Worcester after replacing another ex-Gloucester coach, Richard Hill.
Uncompromising taskmaster boss Ryan is back in top-flight English action for the first time since his abrupt Kingsholm departure in June 2009.
The former Wasps and Newcastle loose-forward has completed a quick-fire coaching clearout at Worcester and has been given a blank canvass to build his preferred line-up.
Former Bath and England lock Nigel Redman has left after one year as assistant head coach, with World Cup-winning prop Phil Vickery not continuing in his consultancy role.
Fellow consultants Phil Larder and Matthieu Rourre have also left the club.
Former Auckland Blues coach Shane Howarth has left Wasps to become Worcester's new backs coach, and now Ryan wants to team up with Hogg once again.
