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You have probably already made up your mind about Mark Goldbridge.

He’s loud. Brash. Obnoxious. Blasphemous. Often much worse when Manchester United lose again. Certainly not most people’s cup of tea.

But what those more traditional among us fail to recognise is that he is exactly what millions of others want.

Gary Neville has seen the light. Despite not always seeing eye to eye with the enigmatic YouTuber in the past, the former right-back turned mega entrepreneur has decided he wants a slice of the Goldbridge audience-conglomerating pie. To the tune, insiders believe, of over a million pounds.

The i Paper had been trying to speak to Goldbridge, real name Brent Di Cesare, for some time. The 47-year-old likes to remain in the shadows, so acquiring an interview was always going to be difficult.

Mark Goldbridge is fuming as his Sky connection goes…

As it comes back, Leeds score pic.twitter.com/DCzS1lBpoY

— george (@StokeyyG2) April 13, 2026

He felt, however, especially elusive. Like something seismic, a merger with Neville’s media company The Overlap for instance, was in the offing. Looking to keep details of the acquisition of Goldbridge’s YouTube channels, The United Stand and That’s Football, under lock and key, any chance to pick the brains of football broadcasting’s most mysterious figure was therefore off the table.

Rather than give up there, the intrigue into why someone as business savvy as Neville had made such a shock purchase only heightened. Those who know Goldbridge best, who work with him on a daily basis, could tell us more about the man himself than any PR-influenced interview ever could.

First up then, was a visit to The United Stand’s surprisingly lavish studios, a stone’s throw from Old Trafford.

“Mark doesn’t come here,” producer Ryan Johnston says. “We are kind of left to it. And Mark does his thing from home.”

The production gallery is on par with anything Sky or the BBC have to offer. There is a set with a touchscreen tactics board for in-depth analysis and a lounge, magazine-style discussion area for further United-based conversation.

Goldbridge’s team of producers and presenter Beth Tucker put together daily United content, with a range of guests examining everything from who the next manager will be to issues over the new stadium.

Meanwhile Goldbridge is at home, in a plush part of the West Midlands. He operates his content himself, from watchalongs on United games – what made him in the first place – to other reaction videos on news for The United Stand. Then there are more watchalongs for That’s Football, as well as watchalongs for live Bundesliga. Such is the power of brand Goldbridge, Germany’s top flight pays him to stream live games on his channels, not the other way round.

The numbers are extraordinary. Goldbridge has amassed almost 3.8m subscribers across his YouTube channels, while accumulating nearly two billion views. Single United watchalongs, not even for the biggest games, can bring in over 500,000 views.

So how does a father of three, former police investigator, not a bobby on the beat as is the common misconception, who changed his name due to the nature of his previous job, do it?

“Work ethic, personality and his opinion,” Tucker says.

“Things just happen to him on videos. The [viral] pineapple video being a prime example. He retweets out-of-context videos of himself all the time. He can laugh at himself.

“You have to be a certain type of person, of huge appeal, to hold an audience of that size, on your own, for that long, day after day. Mark will do anything and people will watch. Somebody said to him ‘you could probably make a video of you making a cup of tea and you will hit 100k [views]. So he did just that [the video from 2022 now has 136,000 views].”

"This is NOT the way Man Utd should play!"

"The football, I do NOT think it's very good… I think it's very similar to Ole and very similar to Gareth Southgate." pic.twitter.com/aOycp7AfEi

— The United Stand (@UnitedStandMUFC) March 28, 2026

Down the years, Goldbridge has clashed with pretty much everyone associated with United. The club do not allow The United Stand into the press box and have had some fiery exchanges.

But it is confrontation that helped make Goldbridge a multi-millionaire, after he went full-time as a content creator in 2018.

“We used to be well behind AFTV [a rival Arsenal fan channel] but since we took over them in 2020, we have pulled well clear,” Johnston says.

“We have just cracked it. Their watchalongs have like nine people on there. Ours is more interactive; it is Mark talking to you.

“This is a more intimate setting. He is more likely to read out your comment. This intimacy works. Others have tried it, like the Anfield Agenda, but they don’t have Mark’s personality. So many others are trying to replicate it. But they aren’t Mark.”

Everyone you speak to about Goldbridge is much more complimentary than the public perception of this angry United supporter.

He likes to spend time with his wife and three children and prefers to live the quiet life in his native Midlands. Rumours circulated that he is in fact not a United fan. Those closest to him insist this was fabricated by a rival, rather jealous podcaster to discredit him.

The measured public appearances away from his watchalongs have been purposeful. The allure comes in not knowing what the real Goldbridge is like.

“The perception of Mark out there is ridiculous,” Johnstone adds. “Yes he is loud on screen, but that is his thing, and why he has got where he is today.

“Outside his watchalongs, he is a nice guy. He has raised hundreds of thousands doing charity watchalongs. You don’t know he does that, because he doesn’t broadcast it. He doesn’t want the recognition.

“He has grown as a person as these things have grown so big. Obviously, when he started doing these videos in his bedroom when he was younger, of course he was more immature. But I lost count of the amount of messages we got during Covid saying that Mark got them through that, mental health-wise. Live two or three times a day, people became used to him.”

Who's ready for Mark Goldbridge ball? pic.twitter.com/he5bdVeJZa

— Sky Sports Football (@SkyFootball) March 16, 2026

When the Neville takeover was announced, the fact that the only images publications around the world could use of Goldbridge were screenshots of his watchalongs was telling.

There has been, as this big news was preparing to surface, a real push to get Goldbridge into the limelight more, to garner the exact audience Neville is targeting.

Goldbridge has recently become a team manager in Baller League, an innovative new league targeting a younger audience, one perhaps disenfranchised by having to sit through 90 minutes of watching dull Premier League matches week after week.

Younger crowds have shorter attention spans, so Baller League, with its myriad of big names involved from the footballing and influencer worlds in equal measure, offers something different: shorter, small-sided games, where the emphasis is on skill and, more pertinently, goals.

“Mark was on our radar since we started,” Baller League marketing director Harry Hesp tells The i Paper.

“He brings us something totally different. Mark has a very strong appeal to a football audience and we’re really keen that a proper football audience sees Baller League as well, as we truly believe that this is a really good football product.

“He really does kind of have a very loyal following and a very broad following: both football fans and fans of content creators, YouTubers and influencers. He’s mastered that bridge of bringing those two fandoms together like nobody else.”

The i Paper went along to Liverpool to see a round of Baller League action.

Wayne Rooney was in attendance, but more cameras remained fixed on one man.

As Gold Devils FC lost out to Clutch FC, coached by Arsenal and England Women forward Chloe Kelly, Goldbridge streamed the whole night’s action on his YouTube channel, popping into a booth before and after his match to give his input.

Baller League is still in its infancy, but the numbers are very promising. Sold out arenas in London – they filled the O2 for finals day last year – and now Liverpool are testament to such.

Goldbridge’s involvement is only going to send the numbers one way. His Midas touch when it comes to content creation knows no bounds.

Read more

• Pete Hall: The mystery of Man Utd’s missing man
• Kevin Garside: Man Utd need to sell Bruno Fernandes before it’s too late

How the link-up with Neville works will be fascinating to watch. It is our first real glimpse into the worlds of the ex-player chatterati and content creation colliding.

Rio Ferdinand has had a public spat with Goldbridge this week, but the new-age media mogul doesn’t have to get on with whoever he is debating with. In fact, the more disagreements the better.

“They [Neville and Goldbridge] have not got on in the past, but they don’t have to be best friends,” Tucker adds.

“It’s kind of the point. Debate comes from differences of opinion.

“This is surely only the start of this kind of thing. I just hope that with Gary Neville on board, fan media starts to get taken more seriously.”

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Blackburn Rovers are not going down; not this year. They beat Sheffield United on Wednesday evening to confirm their Championship status with one game remaining. They will finish 20th or 21st, most likely, and that being a cause for celebration is damning.

It also continues the perfect Blackburn Rovers loop: seventh, 19th, seventh, 21st, or near enough. This club’s new existence is so monochrome that it can’t even commit fully to a crisis. And when the good seasons do come along, they end with Rovers in the highest league position that means nothing at all, naturally

You get exactly the same impression in real time. Against Coventry City last Friday, a team that has just confirmed their title, Blackburn were never outclassed. There was effort and quality. They took the lead and absolutely deserved it.

The game ended level, Rovers players unsure of whether to even attempt to score or be happy with their lot despite winning only four home games this season. You never sensed that this team was in trouble, yet it had been in trouble for weeks, months, years.

The spectacular irony – not lost on supporters – is that there is a direct correlation between allowing the club’s infrastructure to drift and the panic towards the end of this season. With the Ewood Park pitch in a terrible state, a match against Ipswich Town that Blackburn were leading was abandoned after 81 minutes They drew the rearranged fixture.

An existential question with no pleasant answer: is this really living? Up a bit and down a bit, nothing meaningful ever really lasting and supporters getting gradually more disillusioned all the time. Blackburn exist in a closed loop system

It is tempting to blame owners Venkys for all this; perhaps it’s even appropriate and necessary. Certainly it oversaw a gross decline in its first decade here. But this is also a tale of English football itself. Apathy and atrophy feel like crimes against hope, but then you look at other clubs in worse positions and wonder. Is staying above the lowest bar really a reason for cheer? More pertinently, is it a reason to keep coming back?

The wider question, and it doesn’t just apply to Blackburn, is how you re-energise the club and re-engage the fanbase. Ewood’s capacity is 31,400 and this season’s average home attendance is 14,800. Even that is assisted by an away end that constitutes an entire stand. Coventry supporters filled it. They know plenty about coming back from their nadir.

Employing a manager who wants to stick around would help. Michael O’Neill has made himself very popular, but this is a part-time, short-term gig. John Dahl Tomasson lasted 90 matches but offered to leave months before because of cuts to the playing budget.

John Eustace left for Derby County. Valerien Ismael left due to underperformance but one arm was tied behind his back for most of the tenure. There must be greater cohesion between the component parts that persuades Blackburn managers that it’s worth committing fully to the project and sticking around to see it through.

Part of that is a necessary improvement in recruitment laid bare by this season. It is not true that Venkys hasn’t spent money: around £10m in transfer fees alone this season, more than it recouped in sales. It was primarily data-led and focused on mainland Europe and Scandinavia. Players were signed from Norway, Belgium, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Scotland and Germany.

Five of those players were reportedly signed for more than a million pounds and only one of them ranks in Blackburn’s top ten league appearance makers by minutes played. Sidney Tavares, six starts; Dion de Nevez, nine starts; Dapo Afolayan, one start. Championship clubs cannot afford to make many of these expensive mistakes.

Read more

• Daniel Storey: How Hull City made the data nerds look silly
• Daniel Storey: Liam Rosenior epitomised everything wrong with Chelsea

Off the field, there may finally be changes. An almost year-long recruitment process is reportedly likely to end in the appointment of a new chief executive soon. Deep frustrations with director of football operations Rudy Gestede remain and the same is true of chief operating officer Suhail Pasha. Many fans would conclude that nothing will really change until they do.

The eagle-eyed amongst you will have noticed that this covers just about everything. This is indeed a huge task. Too much of this club isn’t working properly and hasn’t for too long. In fact, not working properly is basically the identity. They have spent 13 years in the Championship since relegation and never finished in its top six.

Something has to be allowed to build here. It can be done. If it is, they will come back and this can still all be history one day. But Blackburn Rovers cannot be held in suspension like this any more, waiting for something to bend, break or break out.

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Pretty soon – in a matter of “weeks” rather than months – Newcastle fans are set to get a visible sign of the Saudi Public Investment Fund’s continued commitment to the club.

Confirmation of a further tranche of investment by the club’s majority owners – earmarked to purchase the site of where a new state-of-the-art training ground will be built near the city’s airport – will land in the near future on Companies House, The i Paper understands.

While the impact of leaks and the pace of legal work prevent anyone from giving an absolutely cast-iron timeline, the funding has the green light. With doubts swirling about the club’s direction and Saudi commitment to investing in sport itself, confirmation of the first major infrastructure project of the PIF era cannot come a minute too soon.

The training ground – which may not open its doors until close to the 2030 date that chief executive David Hopkinson has optimistically set for Newcastle to be regularly competing for the Premier League title – will be funded by a combination of PIF investment and capital raised through the club taking on debt.

That last point feels important. While the hope of Newcastle fans (and fear of their rivals) was that the club would be viewed as a trophy asset by a fund with deep pockets, that was never, ever intended to be the reality.

“PIF is acting like an institutional investor because it is an institutional investor,” was how one source put it. No private equity fund in the world would write a blank cheque to fund a stadium or training ground and PIF is no different. Which is why Newcastle, unlike teetering LIV Golf, does not face the prospect of being cut adrift anytime soon.

Are PIF still committed to Newcastle?

Several sources contacted by The i Paper were unequivocal. Despite the speculation around LIV there is “no change” in the long-term plan for Newcastle.

Rumours that they are readying a sale of their stake in the club – which swirled around football circles last week – have been categorically denied by sources, who suspect they are partly the work of opportunistic investors or third parties who would be keen to test the water for a possible Newcastle takeover.

Last week PIF announced a new strategy which split the fund’s investment into three “pots”. The first, “Vision 2030”, is for domestic projects. The second, “financial”, is for investments in equity projects and stocks and shares.

Newcastle sits in the third pot: “strategic”. PIF sources have always said that while the investment is relatively small by the fund’s standards it is important because it is so public-facing. One source went further, referring to it as a PIF “crown jewel” because it gives them a presence in the globally respected Premier League.

Is Newcastle viewed as a good investment by Saudi Arabia?

Quite apart from the steep improvement on the pitch – with the exception of this season – it is also viewed by PIF as a successful investment off the field. Including the sale price of £305m, PIF have invested around £800m in Newcastle so far. According to the fund’s own internal metric the valuation of the club has significantly outstripped that investment.

One source familiar with football acquisitions believes Newcastle are now worth more than £1bn based on the price paid for similar clubs. Contrast that with LIV Golf, which is projected to require further hefty injections of cash to compete with the established golf tours, and you can see why sources describe the two investments as “chalk and cheese”.

Newcastle is still growing. The club have this week advertised for a slew of academy recruitment jobs across the Balkans, Italy and Spain. Key new off-the-field roles, in strategy, data and recruitment, are to be confirmed soon.

For many fans, though, there is a sense of drift about Newcastle. PIF have no intention of challenging the financial rules that have hamstrung the club’s ambitions, which has caused disquiet.

On the ground Eddie Howe’s position has been called into question after a mediocre season began to tailspin while at least one big sale – quite possibly Anthony Gordon, with Bayern Munich interested – is necessary. There is frustration that the issue of St James’ Park expansion is not resolved a year on from a decision being supposedly imminent, although The i Paper has been told that the intention is a call will have been made by the end of the year.

A high-level visit by senior PIF figures next week, then, feels symbolically important.

How do PIF view this season – and Eddie Howe’s future?

Next week’s annual “off-site” meeting at Matfen Hall in Northumberland is important and comes with the club seemingly at a crossroads. The team are 14th and set to miss out on their pre-season target of European qualification, which will have a significant impact on their summer business. Frustration is building on the terraces.

With Yasir Al-Rumayyan expected to jet into the North East to attend it is being viewed as a chance for the chairman to “grill” Howe on this season’s failings. The reality will be different.

The i Paper understands that Al-Rumayyan enjoys a warm relationship with Howe and has regularly enthused about his track record at Newcastle.

It’s been stressed that no one gets a “free pass” at St James’ Park and there is clearly frustration at the way the Premier League campaign has unfolded but as it stands the plan is to continue with Howe next season.

He has been part of all the club’s preparations for the coming campaign and recruitment planning – which has stepped up this week – has been tailored to bringing in players who would operate well in his system and favoured style.

But PIF are, in the words of one source who has worked with them previously, “obsessed with the numbers”. They will want to be across all the data and information and will expect things to change. Insiders suggest lessons of last summer’s fiasco of a transfer window have been learned and work has gone into ensuring there is improvement. The era of signings like Anthony Elanga and Yoane Wissa seems over.

The smart money remains on Howe being in charge – but of a very different looking outfit come August.

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Perhaps taking the opposite path to Tottenham will become the modus operandi of more clubs in the years to come.

Many have lazily labelled Leeds’ attitude to the transfer market as a “No dickheads” policy, but it is much more methodical than that. As Spurs focused their recent recruitment on young players with the potential to reach for the stars, Leeds went for the tried and tested, especially ones with that crucial knowhow in the relegation dogfight. Like Sean Longstaff’s propensity to pop up with a 97th-minute equaliser.

And as we entered the business end of the season, Spurs have gone one way, with Leeds hurtling in the opposite direction, to put themselves on the verge of safety with games in the bank. They head to Wembley on Sunday looking to book a second FA Cup final appearance in the club’s history.

Leeds looked to be “doing a Leeds” not so long ago, giving supporters a feeling of déjà vu as another season threatened to end in disappointment – the story of most Whites fans’ lives.

Seven games unbeaten later and their sensible summer is paying off. Club insiders highlighted several players who have been crucial to making sure Leeds do not, as their own supporters like to opine, fall apart again.

Dominic Calvert-Lewin was a shrewd acquisition up front. Getting into double figures on the goal front is only half the story. Sources have told The i Paper it is the standards the England striker asks of his teammates that has helped eke out that telling, survival-defining few yards when it has mattered most.

Patrick Struijk is another who gets more from his teammates in training, sources added. Ethan Ampadu provides guidance for anyone who needs it, leading by example on and off the pitch. James Justin is another dressing room influencer. His previous experience of relegation scraps is seen as a big part of Leeds’ resurgence. More surprisingly, Jaka Bijol is another Daniel Farke believes could be a future captain.

Farke himself has impressed those behind the scenes. His position has been called into question with regularity. Sources added that while the German’s position was never under review, worrying results earlier in the campaign caused some to consider looking at alternatives.

“Daniel is a calm leader,” one source said. “It is a huge job getting a club of Leeds’ size, with the pressure the job brings, into the Premier League. People forget that.

“He knows when to put an arm around the shoulder and when to issue a rollicking. He has been key to ensuring morale has stayed high, even in the tough moments.”

Part of the reason those within the club refused to panic was the feeling remained that the performances were there – away at Sunderland, a superb showing in defeat at Manchester City – but Leeds were not getting the points their endeavours deserved.

The club’s owners have to take some credit for the turnaround. Supporters rounded on club officials to splash the cash on a striker in January. Leeds were interested in Jorgen Strand Larsen, before he elected to join Crystal Palace.

The Norwegian was interested in a move to Elland Road, but the ownership refused to meet Wolves’ valuation, as it would have pushed them perilously close to punishment for breach of Profitability and Sustainability Rules.

Read more

• Daniel Storey: How Hull City made the data nerds look silly
• Michael Hincks: Aston Villa are being unfairly punished

Leeds understand that the lessons of spending beyond their means need to be learned – especially when there is real optimism that things are also heading in the right direction off the pitch too.  

Elland Road’s much-needed revamp is underway. The initial phase of its upgrade will take capacity up to 48,000. The same architects who have completed Anfield’s expansion have been brought in, to ensure construction will be carried out on top of the current structure, without any disruption to their current schedule. Sources added the hope is that it will take two to three seasons to finish.

With Chelsea in disarray, Leeds travel south to Wembley – roared on by a support that could have sold out their section two or three times over – with confidence their impressive season could have any even more memorable finale yet.

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Hull City have been one of the most fascinating teams in England this season.

Predicted by many to finish in the Championship’s bottom three back in August after surviving relegation on goal difference, Hull still have a decent shot at promotion.

The Tigers entered the top six on 10 December and have largely stayed there ever since.

But here’s the rub: Hull are a remarkable statistical outlier. Their expected goals differential, a measure of how many goals we would have expected them to score minus how many we would have expected them to concede, has them above only Sheffield Wednesday. 

So are Hull City the luckiest team in the country this season, or is the model itself that judges this overperformance failing to properly assess their greatest strengths?

The numbers are indeed silly…

Hull rank 19th for shots in the Championship and fourth for goals scored. They have had fewer touches in the opposition penalty area this season than Leicester City, their opponents on Tuesday night who have been relegated.

Fine, you say, they’re probably a very good defensive team. Well, not according to the raw numbers. Hull have allowed 653 shots – only Charlton Athletic and Sheffield Wednesday have allowed more. They have conceded the fourth most goals in the division too, so it’s not like they aren’t being punished.

And we have to refer back to that xG differential: not only would it have Hull 23rd in the Championship, they would be five goals worse off than 22nd on that particular measure. This is weird.

…but remember what xG really is

Expected goals is a measure of chances according to averages taken across vast swathes of data. It provides a useful level by which we can judge overperformance or underperformance over a period of time. For those who say “well this player is better than average,” yes! If xG accounted for every variable then it would not need to exist. You’d simply have the final score.

Hull have indeed been quite fortunate, in isolation and across a whole season. There is a wonderful homemade compilation of all the missed chances against them that I urge you to watch below. Many of those misses came at crucial times of crucial matches and them not being taken allowed Hull to generate momentum and belief that began to feel unshakeable.

Hull City Opposition Miss of the Season #hcafc pic.twitter.com/zTs4cM9WGk

— Nathaniel (@NathanielWhitto) April 20, 2026

But Hull are also good; you tend to generate your own luck when you play to your strengths, minimise your weaknesses and maximise the impact of your best players. And that’s exactly what Sergej Jakirovic has done.

Counter-attacking kings

Hull might concede an awful lot of shots, but that is a deliberate strategy. They sacrifice possession (ranking 20th by that measure) and territory, allowing opponents into their own penalty area and even to shoot (from low-value areas, ideally). They aim to win possession and, when they do, aim to attack at speed.

And they’re really good at it. Hull might rank 19th for shots but they rank sixth for shots from counter attacks and ninth for total shots on target. And when they choose to, the high press works too: only Ipswich have scored more goals from winning the ball in their final third of the pitch.

When you counter attack efficiently, the chances you create tend to be better because opposition defences are not set. Before Tuesday evening, 95 of Hull’s 480 shots were classified as big chances by Opta. By way of comparison, Middlesbrough’s total was 96 big chances from 694 shots.

A magnificent front two

We have shown that Hull have a strategy for allowing lots of shots and taking far less, maximising quality and forgetting about quantity. Their goals per shot is the second best in the league; their goals per touches in the box is the best.

But last summer they also signed the perfect strike partnership for the plan: Joe Gelhardt and Oli McBurnie, a retro little and large pair. To understand how efficiently Hull have serviced both strikers, know this; McBurnie and Gelhardt both rank in the top five players for individual xG in the Championship.

To supercharge that service, the two strikers have also outperformed expectations. McBurnie and Gelhardt have a combined 29 league goals from 22 xG. Jakirovic has found something that works and that few opposition managers have been able to stop.

Read more

• Daniel Storey: There is a weird feeling at Cardiff City
• Daniel Storey: Coventry City’s promotion is a monumental victory for resilience

Game state is a thing

There is another explanation for Hull’s regular overperformance: they need to attack less than most other teams. Jakirovic’s side have scored first in 26 league games this season, second only to Coventry City.

Also look at when Hull score their goals. No team in the Championship has scored more in the first 30 minutes of matches and only Southampton and Coventry have spent a higher proportion of their matches leading.

If you score first and do not have vast strength in depth, you tend to sit back and your opponents will have more shots than you. That isn’t a reason for criticism, it’s a logical progression.

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Chelsea have drawn up a shortlist of possible managerial candidates to replace Liam Rosenior as the club’s hierarchy consider calling time on his disastrous reign, The i Paper understands.

Sources say the club are “considering their options” after a run of five straight Premier League defeats without scoring a goal, with the possibility of an interim head coach leading the team for the rest of the season.

That would represent a major change from previous backing for Rosenior but the situation is viewed by some as untenable after Chelsea conceded ground in the race for the Champions League.

Missing out on a return to Europe’s top tier competition could cost the club as much as £90m.

The players were on a scheduled day off on Wednesday but the club’s leadership were locked in talks about their future direction.

Rosenior was viewed by BlueCo executives as the obvious choice after Enzo Maresca’s departure given his fine work at Strasbourg, but despite the club reaching the FA Cup semi-finals, they are worse off in the Premier League and could miss out on Europe entirely.

Rosenior was only appointed in January but fans turned on him during Tuesday’s dismal 3-0 defeat at Brighton, during which he was barracked by large sections of the visiting support, who also called out the club’s ownership.

Ominously for Rosenior, co-owner Behdad Eghbali was in attendance at the Amex Stadium.

It has now emerged that they are looking into alternatives to Rosenior, with uncertainty over whether he will be in charge for this weekend’s FA Cup semi-final against Leeds United.

Quite where Chelsea go next is unclear. The club’s former defender Filipe Luis was interviewed to replace Rosenior at Strasbourg and has admirers at Stamford Bridge but it feels inconceivable that they would go with another inexperienced coach to lead a project in danger of veering off the rails.

Former player Cesc Fabregas, who has Como in the European places in only his second season as manager, is an obvious choice but there are other options to take over permanently in the summer, with increasing uncertainty over Marco Silva’s future at Fulham.

Bournemouth’s Andoni Iraola will also be a free agent but some who work in the Premier League believe the way the club operates – with influential sporting directors and a hands on ownership – will put off truly elite managers from taking the role.

Read more

• Kat Lucas: The unstoppable rise of Chelsea’s ‘little Messi’
• Daniel Storey: Liam Rosenior epitomises everything wrong with Chelsea

Rosenior was meant to be the compromise; a highly promising coach who bought into the overall strategy.

However, it has unravelled at frightening pace and his criticism of the players after Tuesday’s loss makes it difficult to see how he continues from here.

Previously the club had publicly backed Rosenior with the intention of reviewing his position at the end of the season. But news of the meeting of senior figures suggests Rosenior is far from safe.

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Liam Rosenior is not the only problem at Chelsea; he is not even the biggest problem. The BlueCo model is broken. Some non-football private equity folk stormed in and believed that they could rewrite the rulebook on how an elite football club can maintain success. What happened next will shock you: they were wrong.

It’s all about player trading, you see. You buy very young (and very expensively), develop, win trophies, sell for profit and have more money than when you started to reinvest (or take out those profits yourself). You try to take a structure from another club, even though that rarely works. You double down on things that aren’t working for some reason. Maybe it’s because you aren’t spending enough and the contracts aren’t long enough?

Still, Rosenior is a problem because he epitomises the misguided fallacy of the model. Chelsea hand out long-term contracts to spread out their cost through amortisation; it allows them to buy more. That is one of the tenets of the project.

Long-term contracts for employees inevitably reduce accountability, even subconsciously. Why does it matter how you play now if your wage is guaranteed for the next six years? That’s the complication of long-term projects at elite clubs: they require shorter-term results otherwise everyone drifts.

In those circumstances, you need a manager who generates accountability on their own. They do so through instilling discipline. Or through their past record at similarly-sized clubs. Or through their tactics. Or through inspirational man management.

And, sorry, but Rosenior had none of the four that made him a fit for this position, with these players, in these circumstances. If that weren’t enough, he also played into the fears of Chelsea supporters about the direction of travel under BlueCo because he was a nepo-baby hire from within their multi-club system. Rosenior became the personification of BlueCo. The hard job got harder.

All the while, Rosenior’s media persona has generated deeply unhelpful scrutiny because it has become its own self-fulfilling prophecy: the sillier the soundbites, the worse the performance.

Former Rosenior's teammate at Hull City, Kevin Kilbane:

"I played with Liam at Hull, and I got on well with Liam; he used to tell some great stories of Roy Keane when he was his manager at Ipswich.

And you see the way he is now, to me, he’s unrecognisable to the player and… pic.twitter.com/Ogt4nX5SHQ

— Vince (@Blue_Footy) March 24, 2026

Kevin Kilbane, Rosenior’s former teammate, may have sounded a little mean when he said Rosenior sounds “like he’s swallowed a psychologist’s manual”, but this stuff matters. Players see it; supporters see it too. Rosenior sounds like he learnt motivational management at evening classes and that doesn’t help. He needed to prove that he was big enough for this challenge and his own words made that work more difficult.

It’s hard to fathom just how quickly this has got toxic. Chelsea have now lost five matches in a row without scoring for the first time since the Titanic sank; just the metaphor they need. There was a desperate switch of formation against Brighton that made no sense and didn’t work. Senior players have talked up their chances of leaving the club. One of them, Enzo Fernandez, was suspended for two games and yet was made captain on Tuesday evening. The club that outclassed them was the same one they took the structure wholesale from.

The biggest problem of all: Chelsea couldn’t afford to get this one wrong. Last month they announced the largest annual losses in English football history. The women’s team and the buildings have been sold. They need Champions League revenue next season and even finishing in the top half seems doubtful now. In those circumstances, appointing Rosenior might just have been the worst mid-season appointment at an elite club in decades.

“Liam has the ability to get the best out of this squad quickly and joins us with the responsibility and the backing to ensure Chelsea continues to compete at the top level in all competitions this season and in seasons to come,” read Chelsea’s welcome statement 107 days ago. It sounds like a bad joke now, or some inadvertent harbinger of doom.

But the real punchline? Chelsea followed the pattern of their own model by giving Rosenior a contract until 2032. There is a real chance that he fails to reach six months in charge of a club that agreed to pay him for six years. Ain’t that just the BlueCo way.

from Football - The i Paper https://ift.tt/QSWv6TB