As Marco Silva’s Everton tenure has been unravelling in alarming fashion in recent weeks, the speculation over his future and whether the club might have to act by removing another manager has inevitably been ramping up. Indeed, as the former Hull and Watford boss was booed off the Goodison Park pitch at the final whistle of that dreadful defeat to Norwich, many were wondering if he might be sacked before the evening was out.
Silva has, of course, remained in his post in the 10 days since but another defeat, this time to Leicester — albeit one that saw a much improved performances from the Blues — really has fostered the sense that the 42-year-old is hanging on on a game-by-game basis.
That appears to be as much to do with the fact that there are so few viable and potentially available candidates for the role, a notion that is lent credence by the list of unattractive names being linked with the Goodison Park hot-seat. David Moyes, Mark Hughes, Eddie Howe, Phil Neville, Chris Hughton and Sean Dyche are all in the top 15 most favoured names among the bookies.
They are joined by more attractive (but perhaps less attainable) options like Mauricio Pochettino, Mikel Arteta and Rafael Benitez and Red Bull Salzburg’s Marco Rose but you feel that Farhad Moshiri’s desire to give his pet Portuguese project as long as possible to prove he can make the grade notwithstanding, the only reason why Silva hasn’t been given his marching orders is because there isn’t a manager who would conceivably come that the Board can agree on.
That’s why it’s so interesting that Marcelo Gallardo, the rising managerial star of South American football and the man most often put forward by football purists of an Evertonian persuasion as being their first choice to succeed Silva, has suddenly vaulted to the top of list of the bookies’ most-backed men to be the next Everton manager. The 43-year-old leapt from 50/1 to overwhelming 1/2 favourite with William Hill yesterday, seemingly without any prompting by media speculation.
Of course, football betting is notoriously at the mercy of manipulation and the odds should be taken with a high degree of skepticism but this dramatic shift in the backing of one particular candidate perhaps warrants a closer look at a man who is expected to leave River Plate at any point between now and when his contract there expires in 2021.
Gallardo’s rise to prominence has been a fairly rapid one, although it’s only recently that there has been an explosion of interest in him from abroad now that his list of accomplishments in Argentina are being viewed as a whole.
He began his managerial career at Nacional in Uruguay after being handed the reins shortly after retiring as a player there, a decision that called time on an 18-year playing career that saw him also play for River Plate, Monaco, Paris Saint-Germain and DC United. He won the Uruguay league title at the end of his first season in 2012 and again the next season before taking over from Ramon Diaz at River Plate, tasked with helping the Argentine giants recover from the stunning blow of their relegation in 2011.
Moulding a side made up of young academy players and some astute acquisitions from outside, he won the Copa Sudamericana in his first season at the helm, River’s first trophy for 15 years. He picked up three major pieces of silverware in a little over a year in charge and six more would follow including two domestic cups, three Recopas and two triumphs in the Copa Libertadores.
He was denied a hat-trick of South America’s most prestigious club competition last month when Flamengo, led by another coach who has been linked with Everton in the form of Jorge Jesus, overturned a 1-0 deficit and won 2-1 with a dramatic late goal.
Gallardo (pronounced “Gazshado”) is credited with instilling River Plate with an attractive brand of attacking football that has made them indisputably the most potent team in Argentina. As described in this recent
Tifo video profile, he favours a 4-4-2 line-up with a diamond in midfield but deploys a flexible system whereby the player at the top of the diamond can drop deep and overlapping fullbacks can also carry much of the attacking threat.
Indeed, tactical flexibility appears to be one of his hallmarks. He is not averse to playing 4-3-3 or a three-man central defensive unit as he did to masterful effect in the second leg of last year’s Copa Libertadores final, but the primary focus is on overwhelming the opposition in midfield and Gallardo’s methods have been compared favourably to the famous Dutch “Total Football” approach from the 1970s.
He takes an active and committed role in developing youth, adopting almost a sporting director role in working to ensure that the same style of play and ethos runs through the club from academy to first-team level. And in a move that would prove very useful at Finch Farm, he has employed neuroscientists and sports psychologists to help his players mentally prepare for games at River Plate.
“El Muñeco” (the doll) as he is affectionately known in Argentina, has also had to roll with the heavy turnover of players that is common in South America’s biggest leagues as teams from Europe come hunting for the continent’s best talent. (Everton, of course, prised Ramiro Funes Mori away from Gallardo’s “Millonarios” in 2015.)
The loss of some key players appeared to have compromised him a couple of years ago — he actually had to rebuild his team almost entirely after 2015 — but he came back stronger in 2018, overseeing a triumph over arch enemies Boca Juniors in the Argentine Super Cup and then beat them again in that “Superclasico” Copa Libertadores final.
River are under no illusions about how attractive Gallardo’s success there has made him to potential suitors. Only last month, their sporting director, Enzo Francescoli, who played with him at River in the 1990s, admitted to
TYC Sports that, “We need to be prepared for any decision. I'm not thinking about what'll happen in a couple of months because it's not even my decision.”
Gallardo is said to have turned down an approach from his former club from his playing days, Paris St Germain, when they were looking to replace Unai Emery and he has been linked this week with Inter Miami in MLS where he would become that new club’s first ever manager. Most notably, however, Gallardo is being talked more and more about as a potential Barcelona boss, perhaps as soon as this season as questions continue to be raised regarding the future of Ernesto Valverde.
Former Argentina international Claudio Borghi was quoted by Four Four Two as saying that ,“Gallardo will be coach of Barcelona in December. He is one of the best coaches in the world. [River Plate president Rodolfo] D'Onofrio said he'd only leave by quitting his post, but I know this from a direct source."
Gallardo was forced to quash speculation a month ago that he had already held talks with Barcelona’s hierarchy, insisting that he was focused on the Copa Libertadores final and concluding a successful season with River Plate.
Still, some Barça observers aren’t sure that Gallardo’s emphasis on fast-paced, counter-attacking football would fit at the Nou Camp where “tiki-taka” is still the prevailing ethos and they caution that, like Tata Martino before him, he could struggle to make the transition from South American football because he has never played or been coached in the Barcelona way.
If the Blaugrana need to rebuild, they argue, then it should be someone who was immersed in Barcelona’s culture and footballing traditions in the manner of Johann Cruyff or Pepe Guardiola.
Guardiola himself is a big fan of Gallardo, however. “What Gallardo has done in River Plate is incredible,”
he recently told TNT Sports. “It seems that Europe is the only place in the world. I can’t believe how Gallardo isn’t nominated as one of the best coaches in the world.”
If there is a knock on Gallardo’s record at River Plate it’s that they have yet to win the Argentina league title under his stewardship, although that appears to have been a consequence of a deliberate focus by that club on winning trophies, particularly prestigious South American ones like the Copa Libertadores. His team selections have often prioritised the cups and that has had inevitable consequences for River’s league form.
That lack of a truly rounded pedigree might give some of Europe’s giants pause when considering plucking from relative obscurity to try his hand in one of the Continent’s big five leagues, as might the fact that he has never been tested outside of South America. That, of course, is raised as an issue by Evertonians who are nervous about the club’s current predicament and who feel that the club need to go for an experienced head coach who has won trophies in Europe.
While that route appears closed off simply because of the aforementioned dearth of available candidates who would likely take the job, it means plumping for a tried, tested but uninspiring old Premier League hands like Moyes or taking a more ambitious leap with someone like Arteta or a hugely promising manager with an impressive winning record like Gallardo as the most likely options.
That latter avenue was the one taken by Espanyol, a club not unlike Everton in terms of stature, 10 years ago when they hired a former Argentina World Cup star by the name of Mauricio Pochettino. An Albicelesti team-mate of Gallardo’s for three years — the two men featured together at the 2002 World Cup alongside Diego Simeone (arguably the pick of that generation to graduate to head coach) but Gallardo earned twice as many caps overall — Pochettino arrived in Spain with no managerial experience and has, of course, gone on to become one of the most highly-regarded managers in Europe.
Could Marcelo Gallardo, a man feted as the next big Argentine managerial star by Lionel Messi, follow the same path as Poch and Simeone, both of whom credit Marcelo Bielsa, under whom Gallardo played for half of his international career, and make it big in Europe? Would he consider the Everton job and has Marcel Brands, with his contacts in Latin America, even broached the subject with his representatives? And why has he suddenly emerged as the hot favourite for the position at Goodison?
It’s not clear but on the landscape of potential replacements for Marco Silva, El Muñeco is easily one of the most intriguing candidates.
