The football coach of the past decade? It would be easy to first look directly into the trophy cabinets and instinctively make the case for a Pep Guardiola, Jose Mourinho, Zinedine Zidane or perhaps even Antonio Conte but, gaze just a little deeper, and the feeling grows that the two most compelling candidates will be in opposite dugouts in Madrid on Tuesday night. Jurgen Klopp’s increasingly historic achievements with Liverpool and previously Borussia Dortmund are fast presenting a challenge but, in this age of super clubs and billionaire investors, there has still been no-one more extraordinary than Diego Simeone at Atletico Madrid. In an era when the leading managers rarely last for more than one cycle even of a great team, the first most striking aspect of Simeone’s success has been an ability to evolve and manage change. To spend nine years at one club major club is an anomaly in modern football. To do so while constantly delivering success is even more unlikely. To do so while that change you are managing is largely the loss of star players is something close to a football miracle. Just take this past summer. Antoine Griezmann, Lucas Hernandez, Rodri and Gelson Martins all departed for combined fees of more than £250m and another partial rebuild was needed and yet Atletico are still back in the last 16 of the Champions League for the sixth time since 2014. They had previously reached this same stage seven times in sixty years. Atletico have also never finished outside La Liga’s top three in any full season under Simeone, peaking with their league title in 2014 as well as two Europa League wins, two European Super Cups, a Copa del Rey and Champions League finals in 2014 and 2016 that were respectively lost in extra-time and on penalties. When Simeone arrived in 2011, Atletico had not finished in La Liga’s top three for a decade and were also 20th on Deloitte’s list of the world’s richest clubs, below Benfica, Newcastle United, Hamburg, Roma, Napoli and Hoffenheim. Their on-field success and a wonderful new stadium has since helped them rise to 13th on Deloitte’s list of revenue generators, but still always behind at least six Premier League clubs. They earned €344m less than Manchester United in the most recently recorded accounting year in 2018-19 but were still even €237m and €154m behind Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur; English clubs who are often wrongly regarded as being on a similar financial keel just because they are also not with their highest tier of domestic earners. It has been an astonishing body of work and, at a time when both Manchester clubs might soon be looking for a new manager, raises the question of why Simeone has never moved followed Europe’s other best coaches in moving to the Premier League. Or indeed why United’s executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward has never simply made a stratospheric offer. Spanish football expert Graham Hunter cites several factors. Having played previously for Atletico, it is hard to over-emphasis the emotional pull and synergy between Simeone, the supporters and his entire football philosophy. “When you yearn for something, and it was exactly what you expected and wanted, it is difficult to stop drinking that ambrosia,” says Hunter. Simeone’s success has also proved that Atletico could compete with the absolute elite, even if there is a lingering question over whether the nature of two such excruciating Champions League final defeats has left permanent scars. “Losing is not what he is constructed for,” says Hunter. His annual salary, which stands at around €20 million, is surely also significant. Unlike many other European clubs, Atletico have been smart enough to shape their entire wage structure around rewarding their most valuable asset and Simeone is understood to have a clause that prevents any player earning more. He would have rather more to spend on players, but quite possibly less for himself if he did go to City or United. The biggest obstacle of all, though, is surely the language. He and his long-time assistant German Burgos did set out on English lessons but it is understood that the progress made by Burgos was considerably better than that of Simeone. As such an inspirational personality and hands-on man manager, there is the suspicion that Simeone himself knows that his vast qualities could be seriously diluted in England. There have been indirect approaches from certain English clubs over the years, including Chelsea, but never any sense that Simeone himself has pushed to go. Hunter suspects that Italy, where Simeone also played previously with vast success, might be the next destination. There is certainly a feeling that Simeone and Atletico are now arriving at a crossroads and a team that have been painfully short of goals so far this season will simply not have the firepower to seriously trouble Klopp’s Liverpool. Overcoming unlikely odds, however, has been Simeone’s speciality during a tenure that has become as unique in modern football as it is also remarkable.