Decoding Chelsea’s “high profile mystery name” and why Sunday could be key | OneFootball

The shortlist for Chelsea’s replacement for Mauricio Pochettino was already being named by insiders almost before the Argentine was out of the door.

Recent days have seen Kieran McKenna put front and centre of the race, with Enzo Maresca of Leicester also being mentioned a lot. Having been linked strongly earlier in the year, Rubem Amorim’s name is nowhere to be seen.

Today saw Sky Sports insider Kaveh Solhekol go on TV to sum up the whole situation as he sees it now:

“Chelsea expect to appoint a new head coach by the end of next week. Leading candidates Thomas Frank, Enzo Maresca and Kieran McKenna. A high-profile mystery name also under consideration. Chelsea have looked at a small number of other names including Sebastian Hoeness and Roberto De Zerbi. New head coach will sign a longer contract than two-year deal Mauricio Pochettino accepted last summer”

Front runner is conspicuous by his absence

So could Amorim be that man? It does seem to make sense. Just look at the list of coaches listed by Solhekol listed above: Frank, Maresca, McKenna, Hoeness, De Zerbi. Amorim is conspicuous by his absence, given he’s as big a name as is likely to be available and gettable for Chelsea this summer.

Matt Law has clearly heard the same information, and he even used similar words to explain the situation: “there is a currently unknown fourth candidate in the Chelsea job running,” he wrote in his latest piece.

In that piece he mentions all of the same candidates that Solhekol does, and leaves out the same name: Amorim.

Perhaps the biggest clue we’re getting that the Sporting manager is our next boss is the fact he’s being left out of everything so far. As others have noted, it’s the Portuguese Cup final this weekend, and it could well be that we’re avoiding letting anything go public until after that.

So pay close attention come Sunday night…