Enzo Maresca looks set to become the new Chelsea manager.
However, the Italian perhaps wasn’t the Blues’ top option.
Indeed, according to Alan Nixon, writing on his Patreon, another young promising manager turned down the Chelsea job before Maresca was offered the role.
Vincent Kompany rejected Chelsea
According to Nixon, Vincent Kompany turned down the Chelsea job before joining Bayern Munich.
Nixon states that this is actually the second time Kompany has turned down the Chelsea job.
Indeed, Nixon is led to believe that Kompany rejected Chelsea last summer before the arrival of Mauricio Pochettino, and now, he’s rejected the Blues again.
Interestingly, Nixon states that the ‘maverick’ manager didn’t have an offer on the table from Bayern Munich when he rejected Chelsea, but he was confident that other big clubs would come calling for him.
Chelsea got a Guardiola understudy
It’s intriguing that Chelsea went for Kompany before deciding on Maresca because these two coaches have a lot in common.
Both have done their best work in the Championship where they played some incredible football with Burnley and Leicester respectively, and both were schooled under Pep Guardiola.
Kompany was, of course, Guardiola’s captain at Manchester City for a number of years, while Maresca worked as a coach at the Etihad under the Spaniard for a long time too.
Pep Guardiola’s understudies seem to be dominating the coaching world at the moment with the likes of Mikel Arteta, Xavi, Kompany and, to an extent, Luis Enrique all taking top jobs at massive clubs in recent years, and now, Maresca is set to land the Chelsea role.
Whether or not Kompany fares better at Bayern than Maresca does at Chelsea remains to be seen, but it is interesting to think that Chelsea offered Kompany this role before ultimately going for the Italian.