Ten Hag straight in at 2) on suddenly weakened list of available managers

This list was at one time looking pretty strong but has now lost Mauricio Pochettino, Jurgen Klopp and Thomas Tuchel in fairly quick succession. Still, it’s good news for Mr David Moyes.

10) Roger Schmidt
Won the Portuguese title with Benfica to end a four-year wait following a run of four titles in five years, while also steering the club to the quarter-finals of both the Champions League and Europa League. Sacked in August after only managing two wins and a draw in his first four games of the 24/25 season. West Ham and Red Bull are said to be interested.

9) David Moyes
West Ham are only interested because they will sadly bottle making a panicky winter call to Moyes for a third time. The Scot has indulged in a spot of punditry work but it is surely not long until his phone rings again with an itchy sporting director on the other end of the line.

Some Everton fans are pining for him to return and Leicester were linked but the wait goes on to see who gives Moyes his sixth Premier League job.

8) Graham Potter
The shredding of a managerial reputation took just a few short months at Chelsea in a marriage that always looked absolutely doomed, but there’s nothing like being replaced by someone entirely incapable to restore that reputation.

With it now evident that peak-Fergie himself would have struggled at Chelsea while Potter reigned, the ex-Brighton manager’s credibility remains just about intact.

So what next? He is said to be willing to wait for the right job having rejected opportunities at Lyon and Rangers amid links with Ajax and a return to Brighton. Currently favourite to be next Tottenham manager, for what it’s worth, and spoken about in certain circles at Leicester, West Ham and Wolves.

7) Joachim Low
The German is one of only 21 managers to have won the World Cup. But no-one has given him a route back into club football just yet after he stepped down in 2021 from the Germany post which he occupied for 15 years – the longest international reign for a European nation.

“The will is there,” Low said a year ago. “I would like to coach a club again. That would be fun for me.”

Low ‘studied one or two offers’ and was heavily linked with the Fenerbahce job, as well as returns to the international stage with Brazil, Turkey and Belgium, but his last club position remains the manager’s role at Austria Vienna, which he stepped away from almost 20 years ago. Club football is a very different place to the one he left behind.

6) Sergio Conceicao
Left Porto after seven years at the end of last season, departing with a Portuguese cup triumph but on the back of a difficult league season where they trailed in a distant third, 18 points behind Sporting and eight behind Benfica.

There have been better times than that, though. Three Primeira Liga titles and four Portuguese cups for a man named the league’s Best Coach in all three of his title-winning seasons.

He is unlikely to sit on this list for too long having been strongly linked with Marseille, AC Milan and mentioned in dispatches for most of the available Premier League jobs.

5) Max Allegri
Sacked by Juventus after the Coppa Italia victory for ‘certain behaviours during and after the Italian Cup final which the club deemed incompatible with the values of Juventus and with the behaviour that those who represent it must adopt’. He did go a bit mad, ripping off his jacket and confronting the fourth official, but the cynic in us wonders whether those behaviours would have been so incompatible with the values of Juventus (which is, let’s face it, a pretty hilarious concept in and of itself given their history) had Allegri been spearheading a title bid rather than overseeing a fourth straight failure to challenge after nine years of dominance.

Allegri is nevertheless a man with six Serie A titles to his name as a manager among plenty of other pots and pans if never quite the big one. And Sir Alex Ferguson likes him.

Think you know your managers? Name every England boss since Sir Alf Ramsey…

4) Xavi
After some shambolic Barca back-and-forth, when he was leaving, then he wasn’t, then he rather forcibly was, Xavi is available for hire. Though little is known of his intentions.

Before the first U-turn, it was reported that the Spaniard planned to take a break before resurfacing in 2025. Ideally in the Premier League, apparently, though the Bundesliga or Serie A might appeal too. Another club in Spain? Apparently not.

3) Gareth Southgate
No longer the England manager, Southgate recognised the time for ‘a change and a new chapter’ – for himself and the Three Lions.

What might that represent for Southgate? Weirdly, a Euros campaign that culminated in England’s first final on foreign soil has probably tainted his chances of a big club chance somewhat. There was speculation over a Manchester United move which always seemed fanciful. It seems like a Spurs or Everton appointment.

There’s a fair chance a statesman like Southgate decides he doesn’t even need the hassle of a high-profile club job. Perhaps a foreign club might hold more appeal than a domestic gig. Regardless, it would be fascinating to see how Southgate fares among players every day rather than every couple of months.

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2) Erik ten Hag
It turned out to be a really quite miserable relationship for all involved by the end as both Ten Hag and Manchester United tried for far too long to convince themselves they could make it work.

While season one delivered a trophy and Champions League football, it largely unravelled from there in a mess of tactical uncertainty, humiliating defeats and signing loads of players from the Eredivisie.

Ten Hag had been revealed as the wrong manager for Manchester United long before the trigger was finally pulled, raising questions of his Big Club credentials. But he remains an obviously talented coach who might just need a better framework which emphasises his strengths rather than highlighting his weaknesses.

1) Zinedine Zidane
Is Zizou a great coach, or just a great Real Madrid coach?

That isn’t to denigrate his achievements at the Bernabeu. Only Carlo Ancelotti has won the Champions League more often than the three occasions Zidane has lifted it. And the Frenchman stockpiled his winners’ medals in consecutive seasons. Add a couple of La Liga titles and Zidane’s record is unimpeachable.

Still, though, we’d love to see Zidane take another job. He seems to be very choosy – fair f***s, he’s certainly earned that right – having been linked with PSG, Manchester United and Chelsea in the past. He has spoken about his level of English being a barrier to managing in the Premier League, but we all want Zidane to take the chance to prove he’s brilliant beyond the Bernabeu.

That prospect, though, gets more remote the longer he turns his nose up at a return to the dug-out. At this stage, he seems quite happy with his lot, and why the f*** wouldn’t he be?