Mauricio Pochettino reportedly thrashed out his Chelsea exit during two days of talks with the club’s hierarchy. It is claimed that ‘differences’ of views on the Blues’ structure has led to the Argentine’s departure.
Pochettino was reportedly called into an end-of-season review with prominent senior figures at the club’s Cobham training base on Monday. The 52-year-old, who became BlueCo’s fourth manager last summer, supposedly met with co-sporting directors Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart and co-owner Behdad Eghbali. Todd Boehly is claimed to have been in touch via telephone from America.
According to the Daily Telegraph, a difference in view on the dynamics of working within Chelsea’s structure were chief to the decision to part ways by mutual consent. All parties agreed to sleep on the discussions on Monday but there was reportedly no difference in feeling when the meeting was reconvened the following day.
It is understood that there were no disagreements over who should take control of the club’s transfer business, with Pochettino largely happy for the club’s hierarchy to target players during his tenure. Nor were there clashes over which players should be bought and sold this summer.
It is reported that Pochettino’s departure was verbally agreed at around 11:30am on Tuesday morning. All parties were supposedly concerned that a difficult start to next season would prompt calls for Chelsea’s owners to axe Pochettino midway through the campaign, something the Blues were keen to avoid after sacking Thomas Tuchel and Graham Potter under similar circumstances.
Legal representatives for all parties will now thrash out the terms of the departure, with the outgoing Chelsea head coach set to receive a substantial pay-off. Pochettino had a contract until June 2025, a slight issue in itself as it posed the possibility that Chelsea may lose their manager midway through their Club World Cup campaign next year.
The former Tottenham boss was appointed by the West Londoners last summer. He initially struggled to guide the Premier League’s youngest team on a consistent run of results, but a fantastic end to the season means Chelsea will play in at least the Conference League next term.
Pochettino was credited with contributing to the impact of summer signing Cole Palmer. He also oversaw the improvement of the likes of Nicolas Jackson and Noni Madueke.
Attention will now turn to who BlueCo will appoint as their fifth manager in a little over two years. Roberto De Zerbi, who left Brighton before Sunday’s final game of the Premier League campaign, is an obvious early contender.
