Monaco and Everton among next options for Wenger
A LOOK AT SIX POTENTIAL CANDIDATES TO REPLACE ‘THE PROFESSOR’
Arsene Wenger has no intention of retiring from football and is even open to the idea of becoming a national team coach.
One job the 68-year-old has been strongly linked with in the past, however, is not expected to be open to him with Paris Saint-Germain set to appoint Thomas Tuchel as their new head coach.
The German has not been formally offered the post yet but with Unai Emery expected to leave at the end of this season, he is top of PSG’s list of replacements, which would also rule out Arsenal moving for Tuchel, of course.
In saying that, the German’s chance of going to Arsenal were remote anyway given the breakdown of his relationship with Sven Mislintat, the Premier League club’s head of recruitment, while the pair were at Borussia Dortmund.
An intriguing possibility, according to sources in France, is whether Wenger might make a return to Monaco should their head coach Leonardo Jardim leave. Given the Portuguese has been strongly linked to Arsenal, where he has his admirers, not least for promoting young players, it even opens up the chances of some kind of job-swap taking place.
In England, Wenger’s best chances of staying in the Premier League could be at Everton should Sam Allardyce leave. Everton’s major shareholder Farhad Moshiri, who was previously a shareholder in Arsenal through Alisher Usmanov’s Red & White Holdings, is an admirer.
It is understood that Wenger might be prepared to move away from day-to-day coaching and take up a sporting director’s role at a club, which would be ironic given how dismissive he has been in the past of the notion of working with a director of football. Also, despite his apparent preferred intention to maintain an involvement at a club, he would consider taking over a national team and was, in fact, intrigued by the opportunity to become England manager when Roy Hodgson quit after Euro 2016.
At that time Wenger decided to stay with Arsenal and while taking over England is not an option at present, other national federations might come calling and not least Japan, where he previously worked.
Finally, there is one last, romantic possibility with Wenger’s brother, Guy, having said in an interview in 2016 that maybe one day his younger sibling would go back to their hometown club, Strasbourg. But that may be for the job after the next job.
Whoever succeeds Arsene Wenger at Arsenal won’t be allowed to amass the same power.
“Arsene earned his position at this club over 22 years,” Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis said on Friday. “I don’t think that there will be other managers, if you look forward, who will have kind of authority at the top of the game with the biggest clubs.
“Obviously, it is the most important appointment that any club makes and the most important employee that any club has so I don’t diminish the role. I just think it would be unrealistic to think that anybody comes in with the breadth and scope that Arsene had at Arsenal.”
Hours after the 68-yearold coach announced he was stepping down at the end of the season, Gazidis was not giving anything away about the identity of the next occupant of the Arsenal dugout.
The qualities desired were listed, though. “Our fans want to see somebody who will continue to play progressive, exciting football that gets people interested and excited in the games that we play,” Gazidis said. “I also think there is a significant piece in Arsenal Football Club in how the candidate represents the club and I think it’s important to Arsenal fans.”
“We have to be openminded and brave in the decision,” Gazidis said. “When Arsene was appointed, I don’t think he was on many people’s radar. That doesn’t mean we have to repeat that but it does mean we have to be bold in the appointment.” ■