Mauricio Pochettino was on Arsenal’s managerial shortlist prior to hiring Mikel Arteta, according to a new report.
Sam Dean reports for The Telegraph that Arsenal considered a number of more experienced managers on a shortlist alongside Mikel Arteta in 2019, before ultimately deciding to hire the then-Manchester City assistant head coach.
Rather surprisingly, one of the names on the list was Mauricio Pochettino, who had only just left Tottenham Hotspur at the time.
Dean writes that Pochettino was willing to engage with Arsenal over the possibility of replacing Unai Emery, but the Gunners ultimately decided to go in a different direction.
The Gunners also reportedly considered Roberto Martinez, and the former Everton and Belgium and current Portugal manager advanced a long way in the process.
Arsenal also had Vitor Pereira on the shortlist, as Pereira himself confirmed recently, along with more well-known targets in Carlo Ancelotti, Patrick Vieira, Julian Nagelsmann, and Massimiliano Allegri.
With the benefit of hindsight and knowing that Arsenal would become Premier League winners again in 2025/26, most fans probably wouldn’t go back and swap Arteta for anyone else on the list.
Not all of the above names made it to the interview stage, with Dean quoting Edu confirming that he “interviewed six coaches, all of them with big experience” and “one who did not have big experience” in Arteta.
Given there are eight managers listed above (including Arteta), that means at least one never made it as far as a formal interview with Edu.
But Arteta did get his chance to impress the Arsenal hierarchy, and he ended up convincing them to give him the job for the long-term. It’s interesting to think about how things could have gone if they’d made a different choice.
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