Ruben Amorim and Kieran McKenna are both waiting in the wings in case Chelsea opt to make a managerial change this week.
Mauricio Pochettino is due for talks with Chelsea’s hierarchy in the coming days as part of an end-of-season review that will decide his future.
Pochettino admitted again yesterday that he remains in the dark on his status for next season, despite meeting co-owner Todd Boehly for dinner on Friday night.
Chelsea’s owners have kept tabs on managers they admire ever since buying the club in 2022 and are thought to have sounded out representatives of both Sporting CP’s Amorim and Ipswich manager McKenna in recent weeks.
Amorim was one of the first managers to catch the eye of Chelsea’s owners after their takeover, and Boehly, Behdad Eghbali and Jose Feliciano have been impressed with him ever since. Even when Graham Potter was in charge, Amorim was understood to be among the nucleus of managers considered as future Chelsea bosses.
Both Liverpool and West Ham looked into hiring Amorim. Liverpool are thought to have given serious consideration to recruiting him, but decided against employing a manager who favours a formation not thought to fit with their squad. Amorim prefers a back-three, while Liverpool are thought to want to continue with the back-four that has been such a facet of Jurgen Klopp’s tenure. Those considerations proved key to their successful pursuit of incoming manager Arne Slot.
Former Manchester United assistant McKenna has led Ipswich to successive promotions from League One to the Premier League. Chelsea chiefs are understood to have been impressed by the 38-year-old’s approach.
Pochettino could easily yet stay on into a second season at Chelsea, especially having set the Blues on something of a roll to finish the campaign in sixth place. He has turned a season-low 11th place into qualification for Europe, which will be confirmed as the Europa League if Manchester City beat Manchester United in Saturday’s FA Cup Final.
Pochettino has previously been at pains to point out that any review this week will be an opportunity for both parties to make a decision about next season. The former Tottenham boss has appeared frustrated with the assumption that only Chelsea would rule on what would happen this summer.
But as Chelsea gathered momentum and pushed to end the season on a run of five straight Premier League wins, Pochettino’s mood softened slightly. He was in jovial mood in revealing his general happiness at Chelsea after yesterday’s 2-1 win over Bournemouth, where Moises Caicedo fired in from the halfway line.
Pochettino also hinted that a dinner with Boehly on Friday would not have happened amid bad feeling or rancour. He then insisted that the end-of-season review meeting has not yet been scheduled.
But when both parties do sit down in the coming days, the specifics of discussions on next season will prove pivotal. If both manager and club agree on the route forward, then there is still every chance that he can stay. But any lack of alignment or consensus on the detail of how Chelsea attack next term, and a change may not yet be off the table.
