Former Ligue 1 winning manager Rudi Garcia has revealed he spoke twice with Manchester United about becoming interim manager before the club decided to go with Ralf Rangnick.
In hindsight, I think most will look back at that as a bad call from the club’s hierarchy. Rangnick was never the right fit to manage Manchester United and he made the situation at Old Trafford even worse.
Garcia is currently in charge of Saudi Arabian club Al Nassr, who have been linked with a move for free agent Cristiano Ronaldo (via ESPN), and he was recently asked about the Premier League club.
Talks with United were documented by the media at the time – but now Garcia has confirmed that they took place following Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s dismissal.
“I think that any coach would be delighted to train a great star like Cristiano and already in November 2021 I was very close to going to United,” Garcia told AS.
“They chose Ralf Rangnick, but I met twice with John Murtough and Darren Fletcher. I came very close to coaching this club and was very motivated to go, who wouldn’t be motivated to coach United? Any coach.
“United’s simple interest has allowed me to be sure of my ambitions in the future.”
While Rangnick turned out to be a disaster appointment, at least we’ve ended up with a top manager in Erik ten Hag.
Garcia could eventually link up with Ronaldo at Al Nassr should the five-time Ballon d’Or winner decide to move to Saudi Arabia. He won’t play in the Champions League there.
