Mauricio Pochettino has stunned Chelsea fans by leaving the club by mutual consent, two days after the end of his first season.
Pochettino looked to have steadied the Blues following what was a difficult start to life at Stamford Bridge, guiding the club to European qualification by winning his final five games of the season.
“Chelsea FC can confirm that the Club and Mauricio Pochettino have mutually agreed to part way,” a statement on Tuesday evening read.
Chelsea sporting directors Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley, who held talks with Pochettino following the end of the season, will now lead the search for the club’s fourth permanent manager of the current ownership’s reign in London.
The new boss will follow in the footsteps of Thomas Tuchel, Graham Potter and Pochettino, who had signed a two-year deal last summer, while Bruno Saltor and Frank Lampard were in charge on an interim basis.
Kieran McKenna
The 38-year-old will be one of the favourites after taking Ipswich Town from League One to the Premier League in two seasons. The former Manchester United assistant is seen as one of the most promising young coaches in the game and Ipswich played brilliant football during their remarkable back-to-back promotion campaigns.
Roberto De Zerbi
He’s available. The Italian made a brilliant impact at Brighton, but results tailed off over the second half of this season before a sudden announcement that he would leave the Seagulls. De Zerbi had been linked with Bayern Munich, Juventus and AC Milan, even before leaving Brighton. Chelsea are admirers of Brighton’s model and previously poached Potter.
Enzo Maresca
Another highly-rated up-and-coming coach who has just secured promotion to the Premier League. The former assistant to Pep Guardiola at Manchester City worked wonders in his first season at Leicester, winning the Championship and securing a return to the top-flight at the first attempt.
Thomas Tuchel
A legend at Stamford Bridge after winning the club’s second Champions League in 2022, before he was sacked by the new ownership group a little more than a year later. The German is available after leaving Bayern Munich. This would be crazy, but it’s Chelsea…
Ruben Amorim
The Sporting manager is admired around Europe and has been linked with a number of top clubs this season, including Liverpool, Barcelona and Bayern Munich. He’s just led Sporting to the Portuguese title and Chelsea reportedly held talks with the 39-year-old a couple of months ago. He seems committed to Sporting, but Chelsea could change his mind.
Hansi Flick
The German boss guided Bayern Munich to a historic treble in 2020 and took charge of the national team from 2021-23. But his tenure was disappointing following a group stage exit at the 2022 World Cup, finishing third. He was dismissed in September last year following a 4-1 defeat to Japan, and recently turned down a return to Bayern.
Sebastian Hoeness
The 42-year-old German has transformed Stuttgart and has just led the club to a second-place finish in the Bundesliga, finishing above Bayern Munich. It’s marked Hoeness out as one to watch.
Thomas Frank
The Brentford manager is highly regarded for instilling an attractive style of football, while also cementing the Bees as a fixture in the Premier League. Having thrived under the club’s modest budget and, in particular, its modern structure, Frank could stand out as an appealing option to tolerate significant input and influence from the owners and sporting directors Stewart and Winstanley.
Vincent Kompany
A shock candidate last summer when the Blues finalised the permanent successor to Graham Potter. Kompany’s Burnley were relegated from the Premier League at the first time of asking, although they did put up a fight in the closing months. Linked with Bayern Munich recently, the Blues could revisit their work on the Belgian this summer.