While Julen Lopetegui has been taking a break from the pressure cooker of West Ham, his future is looking increasingly bleak.
Hammers majority owner David Sullivan is reportedly meeting technical director Tim Steidten over the international break.
Top of the agenda is the future of Julen Lopetegui as West Ham’s manager.
The performance in the desperately poor 0-0 draw with Everton has done nothing for Lopetegui’s standing among fans.
Players have publicly showed dissent towards the 57-year-old.
After 13 games all told, the Spaniard is failing to get a tune out of West Ham’s squad.
As a result, speculation is rife that West Ham’s owners are weighing up whether to sack Lopetegui now or give him more time to turn things around.
Many believe the latter would simply be delaying the inevitable with Newcastle away and Arsenal at home up next for the Irons.
In excess of eight managers have been linked as potential replacements at the Hammers helm.
One name in particular is not going away.
Premier League winning boss spotted and it’s brilliant news for West Ham
And there has now been a huge development in his situation.
Because the whereabouts of a Premier League winning boss is brilliant news for West Ham and grim for Lopetegui.
When West Ham were saying farewell to their beloved Boleyn Ground, Claudio Ranieri was doing the unthinkable with Leicester City.
The Italian manager lead the Foxes to that utterly shocking Premier League title back in 2015/16.
Many believe the likes of that 5,000-1 event will never be seen again in sport.
Ranieri has enjoyed a storied career, taking in a multitude of clubs across Europe.
But that title win with Leicester is undoubtedly his crowning achievement.
He’s one of the few managers who hasn’t been linked with taking over at West Ham in the last eight months.
Ranieri has just played a huge part in deciding who might, though.
It is becoming increasingly clear that Lopetegui is hanging by a thread in east London.
It’s been reported that Lopetegui’s belief his job is safe at West Ham is ‘misguided’.
Ranieri whereabouts looks grim for Lopetegui’s West Ham future
While he’s been away, links to former West Ham assistant coach Edin Terzic have intensified.
The German manager was the brains behind the unforgettable Farewell Boleyn season.
Terzic is said to have turned down the chance to replace David Moyes back in April.
At the time he was busy leading Dortmund to the Champions League final and did not know what his future held.
Now he has became a frontrunner to replace Lopetegui, with his name coming back on the radar after the pitiful collapse at Spurs.
Sky Sports Germany reporter Florian Plettenberg – a close confidant of Steidten – recently revealed West Ham had put Terzic ‘on standby’ to replace Lopetegui.
It made big headlines this week when Terzic flew to the UK.
He was actually giving a lecture in Manchester. But reports stated that while there Terzic would be meeting with Roma’s owners for talks over taking over from sacked Ivan Juric.
That was bad news for the Hammers if they do plan of bringing the 42-year-old back to London.
It’s Ranieri to the rescue, though.
Because this afternoon 73-year-old Ranieri has been spotted arriving at Roma’s training ground.
And Ranieri has since been announced as Roma’s new manager – for a THIRD time.
That means West Ham now have a free run at Terzic.
It comes after West Ham were given huge encouragement by Terzic earlier this week when reports emerged claiming he would turn down Roma.
Whether he turned Roma down because he has genuinely been put on standby by West Ham remains to be seen.
But, according to widespread reports, he is now very much West Ham’s number one choice is Lopetegui is axed.
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