French media reporting Thomas Tuchel to PSG

There’s some potentially big news in the French and German media today. French paper L’Equipe essentially confirmed a report in Germany’s Bild that states that Paris St-Germain is set to appoint Thomas Tuchel as its next manager, replacing the outgoing Unai Emery.

The L’Equipe report is behind a paywall, but Le Parisien has the details. It’s not official-official, but all parties (including PSG’s Qatari ownership) have signed off on the deal and it certainly looks like it’s going to happen. Tuchel, who most recently managed Dortmund before being sacked last year, speaks French and his knowledge of tactics appealed to PSG’s leadership.

So why are we writing about a German manager signing for a French club on a Tottenham Hotspur blog? Because PSG was one of the few destinations in world football that could hypothetically lure Mauricio Pochettino away from Spurs. It was never something that was LIKELY to happen, mind you, but if you could see Pochettino leaving for a bigger, richer club, PSG was probably among the top destinations.

We saw numerous reports earlier in the season stating that PSG had Pochettino on a shortlist (Poch had played for PSG and has stated that he wants to manage them someday), but PSG approaching Tuchel effectively means that Poch had no interest in leaving Tottenham. And that’s pretty spectacular news for Spurs fans.

The other reason why this is good is that Tuchel was also heavily linked to replace Arsene Wenger at Arsenal. So not only can we celebrate that Poch likely isn’t going anywhere, we can also continue to have a good laugh at the Gooners. That’s always fun.