Matt Dickinson, the chief sports writer for the Times, has said that Mauricio Pochettino is the “perfect Manchester United fit – at any price”.
Writing in his column, Dickinson pointed to the amount of money United have spent on players recently and said they should now switch tack and pour money into solving the manager problem.
“United spent more than £30 million, plus salary, on Victor Lindelof,” wrote Dickinson.
“They will pay Alexis Sánchez considerably more than £100 million in wages over four and a half years. All of which makes me wonder what on earth they should be throwing at Mauricio Pochettino.
“Break every record by paying the Argentinian £400,000 a week to rebuild the club from top to bottom? Offer Tottenham Hotspur at least £30 million to buy him out of his contract? Just because they would be unprecedented figures for a manager is not to say that they do not make sense.”
Dickinson went on to say “if I was Woodward I would be doing everything to find out (short of tapping up, obviously).”
OPINION
It’s a bizarre aspect to the modern game that clubs are willing to spend hundreds of millions on players but less on managers. Marcelo Bielsa has shown what a different manager can achieve with the same group of players at Leeds this season, and you’d have to be brave to say that Jose Mourinho is currently getting the best from his players. The club is crying out for a top new manager, with more progressive views, and Pochettino would be the perfect fit. The big question is whether he’s countenance going there. He’s said that he’s at Tottenham for the long-haul but the Old Trafford job is one of the biggest in world football. Does every manager have his price? Players seem to but we just can’t see Pochettino turning his back on Spurs for what must also be one of the hardest jobs in world football. No manager has gone to United since Alex Ferguson left and been successful. Why would Pochettino risk his reputation there?