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MANUEL PELLEGRINI’S position as Manchester City manager is growing increasingly precarious. Executives at the Premier League champions are working on an end-of-season succession plan should the Chilean fail to turn around what threatens to become a barren campaign in Europe and at home.
In a repeat of the process in which Pellegrini was identified as Roberto Mancini’s replacement in early 2013, City’s director of football, Txiki Begiristain, is preparing for a change. It is understood Begiristain has grown dissatisfied with 61-year-old Pellegrini’s inconsistency in determining the team’s style of play and his handling of the most expensively assembled squad in English football.
The Spaniard feels City would be better served by a younger, more dynamic coach. Fundamental to the Begiristain blueprint is that City’s next manager has a clear concept of how the team should function to succeed in the Premier League and Champions League. With Uefa Financial Fair Play considerations in mind and some expensive close-season work to be done on City’s squad, the preference is to find a coach who can operate in such a manner at a relatively low salary cost. Jurgen Klopp, whose bond with Borussia Dortmund has been weakened by a traumatic season in the Bundesliga, fits the profile, as does Diego Simeone after leading Atletico Madrid to an unexpected Spanish title and Champions League final appearance last year. Simeone has been studying English with a view to coaching in the Premier League.
Ultimately, the decision will be made by City’s Abu Dhabi ownership after assessing Pellegrini’s attempts to bridge the current five-point gap on league leaders Chelsea and keep his team in the Champions League after a 2-1 home-leg loss to Barcelona.
That the director of football who brought him to the club has lost confidence in Pellegrini’s ability to take City forward, however, makes his position particularly perilous. Begiristain and chief executive Ferran Soriano attempted to recruit Pep Guardiola in 2013, moving for Pellegrini only when their former colleague at Barcelona turned them down. The Chilean was always regarded as an interim appointment in Soriano’s stated plan for City to dominate English and European football.
Pellegrini has said he is unconcerned about his position. “The only pressure is when I don’t see my team playing like I want it to,” he said last week.
