Gary Neville has told Manchester United that their next manager doesn’t have to be a former player but it does have to be someone who understands and adheres to the values of the club.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s tenure at the club ended on Sunday after a run of one win in seven games saw the team drop to seventh place in the Premier League.
The final straw for the United board was Saturday’s 4-1 defeat to Watford, which saw Solskjaer removed from his post and replaced by Michael Carrick in a temporary role.
A statement from the club said that Carrick will remain in charge until an interim boss could be hired until the end of the season — at which point a long-term manager will be hired.
Since Sir Alex Ferguson retired in 2013, United have lurched from one managerial philosophy to another and Solskjaer’s hiring seemed to suggest that the club wanted someone embedded in the fabric of the club.
With the job the Norwegian has done over the past three years, Neville hopes that Solskjaer’s replacement adheres to the team’s values but that it doesn’t have to be someone with a United background.
“This ex-player in football thing that you mentioned, that isn't for me, I'm not interested in that,” Neville said on his Sky Sports podcast.
“I've called for the values of Manchester United to be adhered to, what I've not called for is ex-players have to be the ones that adhere to it.
“I'm sure Liverpool fans think Jurgen Klopp is absolutely adhering to the values and principles of Liverpool, the city, the football club and he's not from Liverpool. Sir Alex Ferguson did it 25 to 30 years ago from Aberdeen not as a Mancunian, he came down as a Glaswegian but he understood, he embedded himself into the city.
“Pep Guardiola has invested in restaurants [in Manchester], [Ferran] Soriano the CEO — I live three doors down from — he's invested in restaurants. They've invested in places, they've bought apartments, they've invested into the city.
"Manchester United needs owners, executives, football people who will commit to this city, understand the city and also be capable of delivering the results that Manchester United deserve which is being the best in class and the new CEO has to step into the job and he has to be clinical and he has to make sure he isn't thought of the same as Ed Woodward would be thought of at the end of his football reign.
"He may have done a good job on the football side, he may have grown the revenues, he may have grown the commercial activity of the club — and that's great, no Manchester United fan doesn't want the club to earn a lot of revenue because they want that invested back in the team - but they also want people on the football side that can deliver success, that's not happened."
Neville also said that the team have been playing beneath themselves, saying the next manager to step into the Old Trafford dugout must challenge for top spot.
He added: "I do think the players the players they've got in the dressing room are far better than the performances we have seen in the last few months and I hope the appointment of the next manager is the right one and take that step maybe Ole has made and get it back up a level Manchester United fans want and challenge this club [Manchester City].
"You wouldn't have thought of that 15 years ago but now you're talking about basically challenging Manchester City and Liverpool but certainly Manchester City. This feels like what would be ingrained success now, it's been so long Mancini, Pellegrini and now Pep Guardiola have delivered success."
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