Mauricio Pochettino and Manchester United: A Missed Opportunity
There was a time when it felt inevitable. Mauricio Pochettino and Manchester United, joined at last in that Old Trafford dugout, Sir Alex Ferguson’s chosen heir in spirit if not in title. Twice the stars seemed to align. Twice they slipped out of orbit.
Now, with Pochettino driving the United States through a home World Cup with the intensity of a club side in peak form, the story feels different. The job he always seemed destined for may be the one he never takes.
The one that got away – twice
Pochettino has long been on United’s radar. He has said as much himself. Speaking to Four Four Two before this World Cup, he admitted: “United have always shown interest, but the ideal scenario to manage there has never quite materialised.” That line neatly sums up a saga stretching back the best part of a decade.
The first real opening came in 2018/19. José Mourinho had gone. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer arrived as the smiling caretaker, a nostalgic stop-gap while United worked out how to prise Pochettino from Tottenham. Everyone knew who the favourite was supposed to be.
Then Solskjaer started winning. Six straight league victories to open his interim reign, the most symbolic coming at Wembley, where his United outplayed Pochettino’s Spurs. That game mattered. It shifted the mood, the boardroom calculations, the sense of momentum.
The clincher came in Paris. United’s improbable comeback win over Paris Saint-Germain in March turned Solskjaer from placeholder into permanent manager. He got the job. United faded badly in the run-in, Spurs reached a Champions League final, and yet Pochettino’s moment had already gone. Within months he was out of Tottenham, his stock oddly diminished despite all he had built there.
The second near-miss arrived in 2022. Pochettino was at PSG, grinding towards a Ligue 1 title in a spell that never quite convinced anyone. United, again, were in flux, with Ralf Rangnick bridging the gap and the club weighing up a straight fight: Pochettino or Erik ten Hag.
United chose Ten Hag. It is now widely viewed as a misstep, but at the time the Dutchman impressed football director John Murtough and others in interview. Pochettino, though, remembers a crucial detail.
“I was under contract at PSG,” he said. After the Champions League exit to Real Madrid, he was locked into one priority: secure the French title. United, he explained, wanted to move fast. “United were in a hurry to announce their new manager before the end of that season because the situation had become unsustainable. I couldn't negotiate, whereas Ajax gave Ten Hag the flexibility to do so.”
Timing, again, killed the dream.
Ferguson’s favourite, left waiting
Inside Old Trafford’s corridors, Pochettino has never been just another name on a shortlist. Sir Alex Ferguson admired him deeply, first for the sharp, aggressive football his Southampton side played, then for the way he transformed Spurs into a Champions League regular without the financial muscle of their rivals.
Ferguson made a point of seeking out Pochettino’s number and inviting him to dinner. That kind of gesture matters at Manchester United. It usually means you are more than a candidate; you are an idea.
Yet what once felt like destiny now looks remote. Pochettino’s reputation took dents after leaving north London. PSG brought him trophies but not the Champions League. His single season at Chelsea ended abruptly and seemed, at the time, to underline a narrative of decline.
Only now, with distance, that year at Stamford Bridge looks different. Chelsea’s chaos since has cast his work there in a kinder light. He stabilised a fractured squad, coaxed performances from young talent, and left a platform others have failed to use.
Still, doubts lingered. Was his time at the elite level over? The World Cup has supplied a pointed answer.
Pochettino’s World Cup revival
This United States team does not resemble a traditional host nation riding a wave of emotion. It looks like a Pochettino side: aggressive, compact, relentless without the ball. Their intensity has stood out in a tournament where many sides have preferred caution.
They press like a European club. They counter with conviction. They play on the front foot, and they do it for 90 minutes. Among the field, no team has matched that blend of energy and structure so far.
Momentum is building behind the hosts. If they sustain this level, a run to at least the quarter-finals feels realistic. On home soil, with a coach of Pochettino’s stature, they look dangerous.
For him, the stakes are clear. Every strong performance, every knockout step, pushes his name back into the conversations that matter at Europe’s biggest clubs. His stock, once sliding, is rising again.
A coach back on the market
Pochettino’s contract with the USMNT ends with this tournament. He has said he is “open” to staying on, and he may mean it, but the logic of his situation points elsewhere.
Nothing will top this: a World Cup on American soil, a squad largely shaped in his image, a country watching. The Gold Cup cannot compete with that. Nor can a long qualifying cycle, however intriguing the young talent at his disposal.
Walk away after this, and he returns to Europe refreshed, his reputation repaired and perhaps enhanced. Stay, and he risks becoming a national-team specialist at the very moment big clubs are ready to talk again.
There is another twist. As Pochettino edges back towards the top tier, Manchester United have, once more, just filled the job.
Michael Carrick has a two-year deal and, on current evidence, looks a smart appointment. He steadied United impressively in the second half of last season, modernised their approach, and reconnected a fraying squad with the basics of control and discipline. Right coach, right time.
But the timing cuts Pochettino out again. Had Carrick stumbled, had United hesitated, had they left the decision until after this World Cup, the Argentine’s name would have roared back into contention. Instead, the door feels closed, maybe for good.
Pochettino will not lack offers if the United States’ run matches their early promise. Top clubs crave exactly what he is showing again on the biggest stage: structure, intensity, and the courage to impose a game plan.
The question is no longer whether he will manage Manchester United. It is which of Europe’s giants will move quickly enough to make sure they do not repeat Old Trafford’s mistake.
