Now that all the European leagues have finished and the trophies have been handed out and all the confetti from the winners’ celebrations has been cleared away, you’d think there’d be a short break where we could all get our breathe back. Yet a few managers at some of Europe’s top clubs have had other ideas and decided now was the perfect time to create even more drama. How did they create this drama? Well, they all decided that now was the ideal time to fall out with their owners and walk away from their jobs.
Heavy-hitters Real Madrid, Juventus and Inter Milan have all waved goodbye to their managers in the last few days. Plus, as reported on Sky Sports, there are many in the know saying that Mauricio Pochettino at P.S.G. is deeply unhappy and could be on his way out.
It’s now created a merry-go-round of in-goings and outgoings at some of Europe’s elite clubs. So now with many top jobs vacant, and many top managers available to fill those vacancies, the football rumour mill has gone into overdrive with tales of who’s going there or who’s going where.
Juventus
It was a real surprise last year when Juventus decided to make Andrea Pirlo their manager. Pirlo had been one of the coolest looking midfielders to ever play the game and could ping the ball around the pitch with a seemingly effortless accuracy. He was a true legend of ‘Zebre’. Yet, he’d never even managed a team before he was given one of the biggest jobs in the whole of football.
Predictably it didn’t go as well as the Juventus back-staff had hoped and Pirlo was recently let go. ‘The Old Lady’ didn’t wait long though, and have secured their old manager, Massimiliano Allegri on a four-year contract. Only time will tell if it will it be a happy reunion for the two.
Real Madrid
It has been a weird season for Real Madrid, with them always seemingly just on the edge of disaster, and yet they still managed to get to the semi-finals of the Champions League and take the La Liga race to the last day, where they were narrowly pipped at the post by great rivals Atletico Madrid.
However, a good example of how far the club have fallen this year is that when Spain compete at the postponed Euro 2020 this summer, it will be the first time in history that no player from ‘Los Blancos’ will be in the squad. It was no surprise then, that Madrid and their manager, Zinedine Zidane, split up a few days ago.
So, will the now unemployed Zidane take one of the other top vacancies? There’s talk that he wants the French national job, but with current boss Didier Deschamps being in the good books since that 2018 World Cup win, it would take France having a turgid tournament for him to get it. That’s not something that looks that likely to happen though, with the best betting sites having them priced as the favourites at 9/2.
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Inter Milan
Inter Milan have had a fantastic season in 2020/21. As was reported here in Euro Fantasy League, they managed to win their first Serie A title since 2010. You’d think that it would be happy times then for the winning manger, Antonio Conte, but nope. In true Conte style he has instead fallen out with the board at Inter over the lack of funds available and has washed his hands of the club, walking away.
Pundits now reckon he could be a shoe-in for the vacant Tottenham Hotspur job, but many are disputing this, saying that Spurs don’t have the transfer funds available for Conte, who’s a known heavy-spender. Maybe if Pochettino does leave P.S.G. and goes back to Spurs, then Conte could slot in at the Paris club, as there’s no doubt that he’d have bags of cash to chuck around at players there. However it does play out, it’s all change at the top in Europe.
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