Think Alonso wanting to have a crack at the Champions League and retaining the league with Leverkusen is admirable. He’s almost certainly been given assurances by the club that they’ll be resolute this summer. That, or he’s saying he’ll stay to get the attention away for the rest of the season to not distract them from the task at hand, and he’ll change his position in the summer once the job is complete.
Assuming Xabi is true to his word though, it makes for a tough appointment with no perfect options (even Alonso wasn’t perfect, in reality). Emery, De Zerbi, Xavi, Amorim, Pochettino, Tuchel, Nagelsmann, Enrique, Schmidt, Conceicao, Big Ange would be the likely longlist. Deschamps would be a wild card I’d like us to analyse too.
They all have potential issues but all have clear qualities too. Can’t say I could pick a clear favourite from them, and I expect the majority of the fanbase would agree with me in not seeing a clear reason to pick any of them over Peo Ljinders. He’s obviously got his potential issues too, but it at least provides continuity, and could allow the hiring of some top assistants beneath him to fill the gap in qualities left by Klopp and Kraweitz. Obviously there will still be qualities we are missing from this year to last, but that will always be the case after Klopp, the job is to minimise the impact that has.
I’m not saying it has to be Ljinders, nor that he’s definitely a better candidate but to me, he feels like the most likely to avoid disrupting the current momentum.
