Reasons why Mauricio Pochettino can be successful at Chelsea

Chelsea's so-called "diligent and thoughtful process" to appoint a new head coach may not seem quite so exhaustive after it led them back to Mauricio Pochettino. 

The Argentine, 51, has signed a two-year deal with the option of a third, as first reported by Telegraph Sport, and will start work on July 1.

No matter how much it was staring them in the face from the start, the Argentine is the best man for the Stamford Bridge job.

Put simply, Mauricio Pochettino ticks every box. Chelsea need a head coach who can build and nurture. A head coach who will play and develop young players. A head coach with big club and Premier League experience. A head coach who has won trophies. A head coach who can manage upwards. A head coach with something to prove. A head coach with a top-class staff. And, possibly, a head coach who has managed through a stadium rebuild. 

Now they have the head coach they need, Chelsea's co-controlling owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali must sit back and let Pochettino, along with his staff and the club's sporting team, led by co-sporting directors Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart, do things his way.

Chelsea, of course, could have hired Pochettino back in September, when they preferred Graham Potter, but the timing is better now for all parties. The 51-year-old has had a proper break since leaving Paris Saint-Germain and has been able to negotiate his return to coaching from a position of greater strength. Chelsea will hope they will be getting a recharged Pochettino, who has had time to shake off the PSG cobwebs and come back determined to succeed and with a clarity about his work, while the former Tottenham Hotspur man will hope the owners have got their biggest mistakes out of the way and learned from them. 

Mauricio Pochettino will have a pre-season, which is so important to his preparation, to work with the players and improve their fitness and mental attitudes, while the club will have time to try to cut the oversized squad which has been such a problem for Potter and caretaker manager Frank Lampard. 

Chelsea Football Club is pleased to announce Mauricio Pochettino as the club's new head coach!

— Chelsea FC (@ChelseaFC) May 29, 2023

His association to his old club Spurs was the only potential black mark against Pochettino's name in Chelsea's latest search for a head coach, but football and managers move on quickly these days and setting self-imposed limits on which coaches they could and couldn't consider because of their backgrounds could prove very limiting and potentially self-defeating. Had Chelsea's owners decided against Pochettino purely on the grounds he had managed Tottenham with some distinction, would they have also dismissed ex-Arsenal managers in the future, no matter whether or not they ticked every box? Would they have set a rule saying no former West Ham managers, no matter of their potential success? 

Chelsea's rivalry has at times, over the past two decades, been more intense with Liverpool than it has Spurs or Arsenal. So, on that basis, would they turn their noses up at Jurgen Klopp? Of course not. Once Pochettino made it clear his Tottenham connections were not a problem for him, then they did not need to concern Chelsea, who will be aware that some supporters may afford him a shorter honeymoon period than other coaches but will also know that the vast majority just want to get back to winning ways no matter who is in charge. And, whatever people may think of the standard of Ligue 1, Pochettino returns to England and the Premier League as a winner, having lifted three domestic trophies with PSG.

Cynics may mock, given that Pochettino had Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe and Neymar at his disposal, but did Pep Guardiola's three Bundesliga titles not count because they were achieved at Bayern Munich and two of them were with Robert Lewandowski in what has long been a one-horse race in Germany? What about the fact Luis Enrique, who was part of Chelsea's original long list of targets, won two La Liga titles with one of Barcelona's greatest-ever teams? How many of Antonio Conte's Juventus trophies should we disregard for the Italian team being much better and richer than their rivals? A certain Thomas Tuchel arrived at Chelsea having "only" won league titles with PSG, while former Chelsea boss Carlo Ancelotti collected a single French title during his time in Paris. 

Winning is winning, no matter the circumstances, and Mauricio Pochettino has proved he can get over the line. The fact he has yet to do so in England will only provide him with even more motivation. Chelsea's process may well have felt more exhausting than exhaustive at times, but the only thing that matters is that, in the end, they recognised the cleverest thing to do was also the most obvious.