(Roman wonders whether Guus has sorted out Chelsea’s problems and whether Manuel will bring another steadying hand to the tiller!)
I suppose if you want a quiet, charming and polite man to take over a club like Chelsea then, yes, he would be ideal. A little like Hiddink in that he prefers to do his talking on the pitch and only appears at press conferences and on TV because his contract states that he has to, it would be an almost seamless transition from one to the other.
Having decided that Jose Mourinho was no longer the man to take the club forward, Roman Abramovich now has a decision to make. He can try and tempt a man who is eight years Mourinho’s senior but is a safer pair of hands in which to leave the grenade that is Chelsea football club, or he can try to attract a younger manager with potential longevity, such as Diego Simeone.
His choice may say a lot about his own long-term plans. If, for example, he opts for Pellegrini, this would be on a two or three year contract which probably wouldn’t be renewed, irrespective of success achieved. It would be viewed as a way to get Chelsea back on an even keel without losing the ability to compete at the top of the Premier League and in the Champion’s League.
The downside to this is that, despite managing one of the richest clubs in the world, Pellegrini has been no more than average in his forages into Europe. It is OK to say that City always drew the toughest group, but they should still have done better when this was the case.
This year, they will probably win a treble, because this is what usually happens at the club Pep Guardiola is about to take over!
If, however, Abramovich goes for a younger manager with a longer term appointment in mind, then that would suggest that Guus Hiddink has sorted out any internal problems within the club and a manager following him could concentrate immediately on football matters, which is exactly what the younger generation of managers seem to prefer to do and who can blame them?
The other question that may be of interest to Chelsea fans is, how much longer will Roman Abramovich remain as owner of the club? He has been an excellent, if somewhat ruthless, proprietor and Chelsea is now almost unrecognisable from the club he originally took over.
Despite this, he has never demonstrated the desire for world domination as has been shown at Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain, (it’s also probably fair to say that even his pockets are nowhere near as deep as the owners of the aforementioned clubs).
He seems to have been quite happy using Chelsea as his “hobby”, albeit a very serious one and the billions he has poured into the club show just how serious he has been and I would imagine that, if he ever sold out, it would be to serious investors with at least as much money as he has, if not more.
Having said all that, I don’t really see Abramovich going anywhere soon, he still has things he wants to achieve at Stamford Bridge and, for this reason, I do think that Manuel Pellegrini would be a good choice for the next three years or so.
So, next season will see Pep Guardiola at Manchester City, a new man at Chelsea and maybe even Jose Mourinho at Manchester United. What’s the betting on Arsene Wenger still being manager of Arsenal next season, particularly if they win nothing this one?
Final question, who has the safest job in the Premier league? No, it isn’t Arsene Wenger at the moment, it is Claudio Ranieri!
WHY SAY ANYTHING? 