Chelsea did not want to rush their next appointment and eventually alighted upon Pochettino following an exhaustive process. The Argentinian had been out of work since leaving Paris Saint-Germain last summer. He has signed a three-year deal and his staff will include his No 2, Jesús Pérez, his first-team coach, Miguel D’Agostino, his goalkeeping coach, Toni Jiménez, and his son Sebastiano, a sports scientist.
Pochettino is not fazed by the size of the task in front of him. “We are so excited, and I know Chelsea very well, it is one of the greatest clubs in the world,” he said. “So of course, it was easy for us to make the decision to move here.” Chelsea are in the middle of a clearout and are targeting young players this summer. That could suit Pochettino’s fast pressing football.
“It is exciting for us because we love good players, players with the capacity and then talent, but also we want people who want to be with us at this club and be really open to help the club achieve want we want,” he said. “From the beginning, the owners and sporting directors were very clear about the project and we were very excited to join them in this project.”
Pochettino’s training sessions are notoriously difficult and he will use pre-season to get his players up to speed. Chelsea will step up their preparations for the new season, which opens with a home game against Liverpool on August 13th, when they head out to the US on tour later this month.