MAURICIO POCHETTINO turned down management offers to wait for the Real Madrid job to become available, before eventually joining Paris Saint-Germain.
The former Tottenham boss was out of football for more than a year after being sacked by Daniel Levy in November 2019 following a lengthy spell with the North London club.
For a long period of time the Argentine coach was linked with replacing Ole Gunnar Solskjaer at Manchester United - and then again with taking over from Ralf Rangnick.
But it was reported by Mundo Deportivo that he was actually waiting to take over from Zinedine Zidane at Madrid.
Then when it became clear that the role at the Spanish giants was not on the horizon - ironically Zidane left the Bernabeu last summer - he decided it was time to return and subsequently accepted the PSG job in January 2021.
Pochettino secured his first trophies as a manager with the Trophee des Champions victory over Marseille and the Coupe de France last season.
But they missed out on the Ligue 1 title to Lille.
Poch, though, did keep his job with the PSG bosses desperate for him to lead the club to European glory.
Despite the arrivals of Lionel Messi, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Sergio Ramos, Achraf Hakimi, Georginio Wijnaldum and Danilo Pereira - as well as a 2-0 aggregate lead - the French giants crashed out of the Champions League to Real Madrid this season.
Karim Benzema's quickfire hat-trick combined with PSG's capitulation to dump them out.
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And it may well cost Pochettino his job.
Even though he has led the all-star team to the Ligue 1 title, he looks on course to be sacked - with Antonio Conte linked with replacing the Argentine at the Parc des Princes.
Heading to the Bernabeu still looks out of the question which could pave the way for a stunning return to Spurs.
