Manchester City are in the midst of their worst ever run during the wildly successful Pep Guardiola era, and even that new contract he’s signed isn’t entirely quelling talk that it might all soon be over.
They threw away yet another lead against Real Madrid as City’s defence has somehow ended up even worse than Manchester United’s.
Following Guardiola at City appears to be a genuinely thankless task but someone will have to do it at some point in the future whether near or distant. And according to the latest odds, it’s one of these lads.
7=) Mauricio Pochettino
There is no manager Mauricio Pochettino has faced more frequently in his career than Pep Guardiola, so maybe familiarity will breed such great knowledge of his methods that he will be the man to replace him. Currently coach of the United States with a view to the 2026 World Cup, but could he really turn down City? He would have been far more welcome before Chelsea failure.
7=) Marco Rose
Has excelled at RB Leipzig but would still seem a slightly underwhelming choice to replace one of the greatest managers in football history.
7=) Mikel Arteta
Actually ticks a lot of boxes if you think about it sensibly, but let’s be honest nobody wants to think about this sensibly. The main reason this should happen is that it would be very funny and boil enough p*ss to solve the energy crisis overnight.
7=) Ruben Amorim
Obviously just a little ghost in the machine, a price that hasn’t fully drifted to its proper place to reflect the reality we now live in. But it would nevertheless be incredibly funny if he is in fact the correct answer here. Some sh*t will have gone down.
6) Zinedine Zidane
Still seems outlandish but the idea of Real Madrid specialist Zinedine Zidane rocking up in the Barclays at Manchester City feels vaguely less implausible than him turning up anywhere else in England.
Would certainly fit City’s idea of themselves, while City now have the Guardiola-reinforced status that might appeal to the great man. And let’s not pretend that the idea of Real Madrid’s most successful player-turned-manager replacing Barcelona’s in the City hotseat wouldn’t be dripping in delicious narrative.
Still, though. Always feels like Zidane’s prominence in all these lists is far more a product of collective wishful thinking than anything else.
4=) Andoni Iraola
The Bournemouth manager is clearly very, very impressive and taking the Cherries into the top half of the Premier League table was always going to see him linked with bigger jobs. We just thought that big job might come at Tottenham or Arsenal.
4=) Roberto De Zerbi
All went a bit wrong at Brighton in the end, didn’t it, but currently making a decent stab at reputation-restoring with Marseille, who are likely to finish in a comfortable second place in Ligue Un.
2=) Vincent Kompany
He’s the Knows The Club appointment, the Spoke Well, I Thought appointment, and having seen his Burnley struggles rewarded with a failing upwards to make Roberto Martinez blush he now has the Big Club credentials, too.
Fascinating in many ways that being Bayern Munich manager hasn’t really altered his chances here all that much. It’s very much swings and roundabouts, isn’t it? On the plus side, he would now come to City with big-club experience, but at the same time if he’s available this summer then how well have things gone in Germany? Then again, a year is now about the standard length of service for any Bayern manager so maybe it all means absolutely nothing.
And that’s why he’s still right up there.
2=) Michel
Such is the nature of the modern game that Knows The Football Club can now also be Knows The Football Group. Michel had Girona on one of the least likely title bids ever seen in La Liga and ‘fading to third behind Real Madrid and Barcelona’ still represented astonishing over-achievement last season. But does all rather feel like he may have slightly missed the boat having failed to land a big job – inside or outside the Football Group – on the back of that unrepeatably stellar 23/24.
Girona have reverted to the mean this year, and while sitting mid-table in La Liga is still no disgrace, it does rather reduce one’s chances of becoming Manchester City manager, we think.
1) Xabi Alonso
This would be quite something, and there are plenty of reports suggesting it could be a goer. But here surely is a manager who almost certainly will end up at one of the giant clubs he represented as a player. The beauty of being a highly-rated young manager who played for Liverpool, Bayern Munich and Real Madrid is that you’re going to have plenty of options.
Decided to stay at Bayer Leverkusen for at least one more year after last season’s unbeaten (domestically at least) antics, and that does raise the possibility of his timing being better with regard to City than any of the great clubs on his CV. It’s also a risk; there has to be a very decent chance last summer marked the very high point of his reputation and standing, and at a time when two of his three ideal jobs were available.
