Chelsea line up Hiddink

14 April 2012

Dutch coach Guus Hiddink has cleared his way to join Chelsea this summer by announcing that he is ready to quit as boss of Russia.

The move by Hiddink, who has a close working relationship with Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich, will increase the pressure on the Premiership champions' current manager, Jose Mourinho.

Hiddink, personally recruited by Abramovich to take over the Russian national team, is in regular contact with the Chelsea owner and would be his principal target if Mourinho leaves in the summer.

The Dutchman has an outstanding track record, most recently with South Korea and Australia in the past two World Cup campaigns and as a club manager with PSV Eindhoven.

Chelsea are six points behind Manchester United in the Premiership and the board are surprised that Mourinho should be complaining about injuries despite spending £50million on players last summer. Hiddink's admission comes at a time when there is fresh speculation about the future of Mourinho, whose team beat Macclesfield 6-1 in the FA Cup third round yesterday.

If Chelsea fail to win the Champions League, despite recruiting superstars Andriy Shevchenko, Michael Ballack and Ashley Cole, Mourinho's future would be uncertain, even though Chelsea chief executive Peter Kenyon insists that the Portuguese will be in charge next season.

Hiddink's vision of open, attacking play contrasts with Chelsea's current functional style and more closely fits with the approach Abramovich is said to prefer.

He took over as coach of the Russia team in 2005, after being recruited by Abramovich and the president of the Russian FA, Vitali Mutko, but has now prepared his assistant, Alexander Borodjuk, to take charge.

Hiddink, whose deal runs out in 2008, said: "It's really time to say in Russia 'Borodjuk takes over now'.I have the energy to go and do something new and get a lot of satisfaction out of that. The past few years I have enjoyed a lot of successes. I'm grooming my assistant as a top-class coach so I'm no longer needed soon."

Hiddink gave an insight into his relationship with Abramovich which is sure to unnerve Mourinho.

Talking about the problems of coaching Russia, who play England in two Euro 2008 qualifiers this autumn, Hiddink, said: "Abramovich has created a massive football academy here (in Russia). But he told me that Russia has not played a significant role in football for 10 years. He asked me if I could give him a helping hand.

"He was here the other day. He and I talked for a while about a number of things. He stays in the background and he is not pushy with things. I get on with him very well."

Last month, Abramovich said he and Mourinho did not have friendly relations but they are warm enough'.

Hiddink's interview was published yesterday in Elf Magazine in Holland. Frank Arnesen, now a key executive at Chelsea,was director of football at PSV when Hiddink was coach there.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in