Mauricio Pellegrino officially presented as Vélez Sarsfield manager | OneFootball

After flopping at both Southampton and Leganés, Mauricio Pellegrino is back in the football management business.

Six days after it was announced Pellegrino would take charge of Argentine outfit Vélez Sarsfield, the club formally presented him on Wednesday.

Pellegrino came up through the Vélez academy as a player and won four league titles and the 1994 Copa Libertadores trophy before featuring at a number of clubs in Europe, including Barcelona, Valencia, Liverpool, and Alavés.

However, he has not had the same success as a manager in Europe, and he knows that his reputation as a manager in the game is currently on thin ice.

“We know what is at stake,” he said. “I know the risk I take, but I also enjoy what I do and hope to do my best.

“In football, you can win, draw or lose; in our profession, we aim to win, if not I at least try to make people feel identified.

“I don’t want to deviate from the values I learned in Velez, and my aim is to make the fans proud of the team that represents them.”

Last season, Vélez Sarsfield finished third in the Superliga under Gabriel Heinze but were upset in the first round of the 2020 Copa Sudamericana by Ecuadorian outfit Aucas.

Pellegrino only won eight out of a possible 34 matches at Southampton and oversaw some of the biggest transfer flops in the history of the club.

His spell at Leganés was actually worse on a points-per-game basis, winning just 13 of his 51 games in charge of the LaLiga side before getting the sack in October.