Nearly there...

So it seems that the appointment of Sven-Goran Eriksson as our next manager is all but assured, given that reports suggest he has agreed 'in principle' to a three-year deal at the club and already lined up Roland Andersson as his number 2.

What seems to be holding the official announcement of the appointment is the need for Thaksin Shinawatra to acquire (at least) a holding of 75% in the club, following on from the announcement of the offer document to the Plus Markets earlier this morning (and something the club confirmed):

On 21st June 2007 the Boards of Manchester City and UK
Sports Investmentsannounced a recommended cash offer by UK Sports Investments to
acquire theentire issued and to be issued share capital of Manchester City other
than theManchester City Deferred Shares. The Board of UK Sports Investments
announcesthat the Offer Document and Form of Acceptance relating to the Offer
are beingposted to Manchester City Shareholders today.The Offer will remain open
for acceptance until no later than 1.00 p.m. on 17July 2007.

Once the announcement is official I'll post up more on the appointment, but suffice to say at this stage I'm very much behind the appointment and think this is a positive long term move for us.

It hasn't stopped the cynics from piping up though.

No news is no news

THAKSIN Shinawatra, the would-be owner of Manchester City,
has had a further £123million frozen by authorities in Thailand.
The Asset
Examination Committee froze £830m last week, believed to be from the sale of
telecommunications company Shin Corp.
After that initial suspension of funds
Shinawatra's representatives insisted that the ex-Prime Minister of Thailand
still had enough funds to complete the takeover deal.

-MEN.

This coming only hours after he apparantly 'assured' the board that he has sufficient funds in place to continue with the takeover, and that a deal could be completed 'this week'.

I guess it is the dog days of summer news wise at the moment as the slightest inkling of news is sending most of the media outlets scurrying to fill up the required column and online inches.

This is none moreso than with any 'news' of the impending managerial appointment. From today's newsfeeds the press is split between the opinion that either Sven-Goran Eriksson or Juande Ramos were set to be appointed, although the weekend brought us new candidates in the shape of Didier Deschamps,Mark Hughes, Jean Tigana and Chris Coleman.

One thing is for certain with all of this. Whoever is ultimately appointed will have beaten off the biggest ever reported shortlist in managerial history.

Noel Gallagher on matters City related

"This takeover is never going to happen now, because the
government has had his bank accounts frozen. It's pure Man City. I'm loving
it."The fixture list comes out on Thursday, we haven't got a manager, we've only
got half a team and we haven't sold any season tickets. It's brilliant."I'm
thinking of mounting a hostile takeover - me and Mike Pickering. I reckon we
could scrape together about £400,000 in cash. I reckon we would get it for
that."

Noel Gallagher - sounding a touch well oiled, had a brief interview with the BBC about the takeover, managerial situation and Joey Barton.

Unlike myself, his actually aired and the full link is here.

Now Koeman, Ramos in the frame?

Bookies have seen a major punt on Ronald Koeman to be the
next permanent manager of Manchester City.
bet365 spokesman were among the
first to see the money, spokesman Steve Freeth explaining: "Koeman has been
drifting for weeks now, but the vultures pounced on Friday morning to take any
big price they could.
"A couple of bets were taked at 40/1, followed by 20/1,
12/1 and then 5/1 before we waved the white flag by going 2/1 favourite.
"All
this frenzied betting activity took place in less than two hours."
It was a
similar story at Hills, with spokesman Graham Sharpe revealing: "After taking a
number of bets of up to £200 at 16/1 we have been forced to cut his odds all the
way down to 2/1 at which price we have still been taking bets.
PSV boss
Koeman has been well backed elsewhere too, though Blue Square and Sky Bet still
offer 5/1 and he's trading at around the 4/1 mark on Betfair.

-Bettingzone.co.uk

Generally the bookies don't get it wrong all that often, but is being the favourite for the City job a sure sign that a manager is anything but guaranteed to take the job?

There were also reports today Juande Ramos's agent had contacted the club - but how much of this maybe merely used as leverage in his contract contract negotiations with Seville.

Billy Davies was also linked as well today, perhaps signalling that the press (and bookies) know as much as the rest of us?

Ranieri takes charge at Juve

I expected the stories linking the vacant job at Juve with Claudio Ranieri to be nothing more than idle speculation - especially given the comments attributed to him that appeared to suggest he had all but taken the City job (in principle at least), but today's announcement that he has succeeded Didier Deschamps at the newly-promoted side was certainly a shock and has left most Blues in a state of flux.

No real reasons have come out thus far to suggest his reasons for taking the Juve job over he City one (merely some hyperbole at the press conference), so it appears that either:

a) He was keen to take the City job, and may have tentatively agreed to take charge, only for the lure of the Juve post to turn his head at the last minute.

Or perhaps more worryingly,

b) He became disenchanted/concerned at the time the takeover appears to be taking and decided he couldn't wait around for something that may not come to fruition - particularly with an offer from Juve landing on his doorstep.

It has certainly put people in pessimistic mood, with a shortlist of Ranieri, Houllier, Eriksson etc now appearing to comprise Jewell, Warnock and Souness.

Perhaps ofmost concern is that this is now throwing weight behind the rumour that the Shinawatra takeover is soon to be dead in the water - leading to the prospect of the current board remaining in charge and scratching around for a replacement for Pearce (how foolish would they then appear) echoing a situation just over ten years ago when Alan Ball arrived at the club ludicrously late in the day to try and assemble a side with little or no budget.

Yet again though, our board are remaining extremely quiet over the whole affair - not even so much as a 'We are conducting a thorough search for the next manager and have targets in sight' type message, leaving most to the conclusion that there is nothing but confusion reigning at the club at the present time.

The silence is beginning to speak volumes.

Ranieri resigns from Parma

From BBC Sport:

Claudio Ranieri has resigned as manager of Italian Serie A
side Parma.
The former Chelsea manager is expected to eventually take over
at Manchester City, who sacked Stuart Pearce at the end of the season.
The
56-year-old Italian took over the struggling Parma side in February and guided
them to safety, with a 12th-place finish.
His impressive stint has
reportedly convinced the City board he is the man to take over from Pearce.
A statement from Parma said: "Claudio Ranieri has informed the club of his
intention to leave his role as first-team coach.
"The club would like to
thank him for the precious work he carried out, which resulted in keeping Parma
in Serie A. We wish him success for the future."

What has been interesting in developments over the past day or so is the words that have come from the Ranieri camp - whilst never attributable to him directly, almost certainly done so with his consent:

"The Manchester City challenge reminds me of the
experience I had at Chelsea where without spending £1, we built a good team.
"I created the Chelsea miracle from nothing. My achievement convinced Roman
Abramovich to buy the club. Then, mountains of money came as well as a selection
of top players."

You do tend to forget that in the age of Mourinho and Abramovich, it was Ranieri who brought the likes of Cech, Cole, Lampard and Gudjohnsen to the club, whilst bringing through a young John Terry.

It seems a foregone conclusion that barring a miracle (we are talking about City here) things will be progressed along over the next week, and it is hoped that Ranieri will already be assessing the current squad with a view to reinforcing it shortly after his arrival.

Bookies unsure as Ranieri's hints at Parma stay

So from Claudio Ranieri being a racing cert to be named the next manager following the end of the Italian season - which he guided Parma from the relegation zone to safety, his odds have lengthened in the wake of his comments which hint at a desire to remain with the Serie A side.


Ranieri has said, "I would like to remain at Parma it is a healthy club, led by people who love football. But my future has yet to be decided."


The bookies have shuffled the favourites around quite a bit on this one, as with several managers not in work augmented by those who have become available since the end of the season it is making for a lengthy list of available candidates - yet what is unknown is exactly who wants the job, and who is being considered for it.


For more on football (and all sports) betting visit BetUs.com.

Sven in u-turn on City job?

"City is a big, big club with unbelievable support. It would
be an honour for me to be manager, like it would be for all other managers.
Every time I visited the club as England coach I was struck by the passion of
the fans and was made to feel welcome and at home by nice people. "They have a
beautiful stadium and the possibility of a new owner and of course I would talk
to them if they indicate they are interested in me becoming coach.Established
"City is an established Premiership club with great potential and I know they
have ambitions to be challenging higher up the table."

-Sven-Goran Eriksson.

This coming less than a week after he appeared to 'snub' the club by saying he wanted to get back into club management but it wouldn't be at City - something the press were all too happy to jump all over, and now it seems he is keen after all.

Why the change of heart? Either he was 'misquoted' as he claims in the Inside Story programme or if his original option of club management has now fallen through. It's hard not to be sceptical I guess as to Eriksson motives, but for me if he was available he would be the choice for me.

His record in club management is an excellent one, enjoying success wherever he has been (in Sweden, Portugal and Italy) and his England record stands comparison with other managers. The press never warmed to him not being an Englishman and the country were under some sort of delusion that the England time he had were actually capable of winning tournaments rather than an over-hyped set of players who at best were a quarter-final side.

The one concern I would have is that he has been out of club management for some time, and there is the worry that the game has moved on, but it isn't as though he has been out of football entirely and with his name and money available he would be able to attract players of the calibre that other candidates would not.

This is clearly a huge appointment that the club is going to make, and whoever it is, it needs to be a high profile manager with a succesful track record in terms of results and in the transfer market.

That criteria alone should see many of the names linked with us scratched off the list.

Betting suspended on Ranieri

William Hill press release:

Bookmakers William Hill have suspended their book on the
next Manchester City manager after a flurry of support for Claudio Ranieri
forced his odds down from 6/4 to 4/6 favourite.
'We had one customer trying
to get a bet of £8000 on in a Chelsea betting shop before we started to see a
general gamble with people apparently wanting to take any price about Ranieri
and as we had already been tipped off by a foreign source that the former
Chelsea boss was a live contender for the City job we decided to close the book
for the time being in case negotiations might already be going on behind the
scenes'.
Hill had also seen money for Gerrard Houllier, the biggest bet of
£200, as he was backed from 10/1 to 6/1 second favourite, but the only other
serious interest was in Louis Van Gaal for whom Hills took a £200 bet at 9/1.
'There was no serious cash for any other contender outside of these three'
added Sharpe. 'There always comes a time in these markets where you first
suspect and then know that someone knows more than we do.'
Closing Man City
boss odds....4/6 Ranieri; 6 Houllier; 9 Van Gaal; 11 Hiddink; Koeman; 16 Hughes;
20 Warnock.

With van Gaal, Houllier and Koeman apparantly ruling themselves out of contention earlier today, it does seem that the smart money is on Ranieri's appointment.

So who is next?

The decision to sack Stuart Pearce may not have been surprising, but the timing probably was as it seemed that there may be some hope for him as regards a future at the club.

Less than twenty-four hours though, after a 2-1 defeat at Tottenham (the result he started his tenure with) Pearce has had his contract terminated - the club announcing the news in a brief, terse statement.

Before the dust has had time to settle on the managers chair, there is news aplenty as regards Pearce's successor - to go along with reports that the takeover is set to be completed within the next week.

When time permits over the next couple of days I'll have a more in-depth look at the Pearce reign, along with all the end of season round-up's I have planned.

But for now, who are the candidates in the frame for the hot seat?

Stories of Sam Alladyce began to resurface today, but it may be too late as as Newcastle have a press conference scheduled tomorrow - seemingly to rubber-stamp the announcement. Adding two and two together, there are suggestions that Paul Jewell's departure could pave the way for his arrival, something though that Dave Whelan was quick to dismiss and news that he wants to take a break are seemingly accurate.

So who else? Paul Simpson's name could again be in the frame, whilst former-Preston man Billy Davies is highly regarded and Chris Coleman is of course available following his sacking at Fulham.

From the foreign contingent, Ronald Koeman was reportedly interested in moving to the Premiership (albeit with Fulham) and Gerard Houillier is believed to be interested in a return but Sky Sports linked Guus Hiddink with us at odds of 6/1. News of Sven Goran Eriksson also surfaced but seemingly Claudio Ranieri is the hot favourite with the bookies.

I would be surprised (or maybe not with our board) if there wasn't someone in the wings waiting for an (official) approach, but at least making the decision early has given the board (current or new version) time to get the right man in and give them time to get to grips with the club and the squad in time for next season, one which I expect the manager to hit the ground running.