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Zinedine Zidane’s wait after ‘telling friends’ he fancied becoming Man Utd manager
With the pressure mounting on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, speculation has already begun to shortlist potential replacements at Old Trafford.
After losing to Leicester on Saturday, United’s manager now faces a crucial week in charge, with Atalanta and rivals Liverpool visiting.
United’s board of directors is thought to have no plans to fire their manager just yet, but if form continues to deteriorate, they may begin to reconsider.
And the fact that former Real Madrid manager Zinedine Zidane is still unemployed will undoubtedly not go unnoticed by the club’s hierarchy.
The Frenchman led Real Madrid to three Champions League titles in his two stints as manager, but he is still taking a break from the game after leaving at the end of last season.
Zidane has not indicated a desire to return to the dugout anytime soon, but a call from United would certainly be appealing given his previous stance on the role.
When Jose Mourinho’s position at Old Trafford looked precarious in 2018, the 49-year-old expressed interest in taking over.
He reportedly told friends at the time t that if Mourinho was fired, he wanted to be United’s next manager.
That scenario did occur in December of that year, but United executives chose to appoint Solskjaer as interim manager before appointing him permanently the following March, by which time Zidane had completed his return to the Bernabeu.
Few could argue with United’s decision to stick with Solskjaer after his strong start, though things haven’t gone as smoothly since.
The fact that Solskjaer has yet to win a trophy sticks out like a sore thumb, whereas Zidane’s glittering CV is as good as proof of his capabilities for the role as you could hope for.
As a player, Zidane was linked with a move to United, but the allure of Spanish football drew him to Los Blancos, despite his admission that the Red Devils were among Europe’s elite clubs.
Now, two decades later, he would almost certainly be one of the names considered if Solskjaer were to be fired.
Gary Neville has been a vocal supporter of his former teammate and believes Zidane will not be one of the candidates to replace him.
“Will Zidane come? Not sure. We’re just speculating now, throwing names in the air,” Neville said on an Instagram Q&A.
“It’s like when you’re making soup and you taste it having put a load of ingredients in and it’s not particularly great and then you just start adding stuff thinking it’s going to make it better.
“It’s definitely not going to make it better.”
He also ruled out Antonio Conte and Brendan Rodgers, before adding: “I’m not in to that, giving someone a squad.
“We tried that with Jose [Mourinho], ‘Give Jose a squad and we’ll definitely win the league’.
“We didn’t, and in the end it was a mess and everybody wanted him out.”
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Zinedine Zidane’s wait after ‘telling friends’ he fancied becoming Man Utd manager
