Danny Higginbotham: Forget Jurgen Klopp – City must promote Patrick Vieira to get a flexible coach for their young talent

Patrick Vieira would be ideal as someone who could bring City’s youngsters into the first team

Jurgen Klopp and Patrick Vieira (Getty Images)

The big managerial story of the week was Jürgen Klopp's announcement that he will be available for a new job next season – and his comment about having to take "whatever a free half-year is called" after leaving Borussia Dortmund this summer hardly seemed heartfelt. He is obviously ready for a new challenge immediately. But it's typical of the way we overlook young managers in this country that he was so quickly being linked with Manchester City when they have a ready-made successor to Manuel Pellegrini in Patrick Vieira.

People will say that Vieira constitutes a risk and that he’s only managed the club’s elite development squad for a few years. But that’s exactly the same level of experience that Pep Guardiola had managing Barcelona B from 2007 to 2008 when he stepped up to succeed Frank Rijkaard as Barça coach. Vieira has assembled the best Under-21 side that I’ve seen this season. They’ve got players like young midfielder Brandon Barker – a real asset. Vieira knows them and the club inside out, so there will be a far better prospect of them getting through into the first team, which is the holy grail for City and their new Academy facility. If City – or any other Premier League side – were to move for Klopp, it would just be another story of him bringing more players in, with fewer of the club’s young players getting a chance. How many top-flight clubs do we see developing young players? After Southampton, I’m struggling.

For more evidence of the value of appointing someone young from within, who has an instinctive understanding of his club, just look at Swansea City and Garry Monk. No one gave Monk a prayer when, at the age of just 34, he succeeded Michael Laudrup in February last year. But I would argue that he is a strong candidate for manager of the season. Swansea have already equalled their record points tally for the Premier League and they have six games to go. Monk lives and breathes that club and they’re reaping the benefits.

His success proves a broader point, in my opinion: that it does not matter what your age is when you step into a managerial job. In fact, I would argue that younger managers are very often better equipped to deal with the tactical challenges of the modern game than older ones. It’s no coincidence that the average age of the managers who have taken their clubs to the quarter-finals of the Champions League is only 46, with three of them – Atletico Madrid’s Diego Simeone, Barcelona’s Luis Enrique and Bayern Munich’s Pep Guardiola – all aged 44. Only Carlo Ancelotti (55) is over 50.

These young managers and others I’ve observed while co-commentating on Serie A, the Bundesliga and Portugal’s Primeira Liga this season, have generally shown greater tactical flexibility than the older managers, who are perhaps more set in their systems and ways. That’s human nature: the older you become, the more reluctant you often are to change.

Klopp will leave Borussia Dortmund at the end of the season

Compare Simone to City’s Pellegrini, for example. Both play 4-4-2 or 4-4-1-1 but Pellegrini uses a rigid 1990s version, with the added weakness that his midfielders do not track back. (That’s why United overwhelmed City last Sunday, in the way we predicted they would, on these pages.) Simeone uses a flexible 4-4-2, which becomes a counter-attacking set-up away from home. Atletico have flourished as a result.

There is no way that City’s squad is inferior to Atletico’s but the difference in performance in Europe has been overwhelming in the past two seasons. It’s purely the tactical deficit which has caused the failure of British sides in Europe, proof to my mind that the young European managers, with their greater flexibility, sometimes using three or even four systems in a single game, are just operating more effectively. I think things would have been different for Liverpool in Europe if they’d come across the system built around three at the back a bit earlier. Jose Mourinho and Arsène Wenger were simply outsmarted.

The Premier League managers have a very different age profile, with 14 of the 20 aged 50 or over and the three youngest – Monk, plus Mauricio Pochettino and Sean Dyche, both 43 – all nearing the end of the season with their reputations enhanced. (The average age of the 20 is just shy of 52.)

Vieira is currently City's youth team manager (Getty Images)

Of course, there are exceptions to the rule. Both Mourinho (52 and actually one of the older men now) and Louis van Gaal (63) are flexible and open to change. And there was obviously Sir Alex Ferguson, one of the most modern-minded managers of them all, who would play a different formation away in Europe than at home, and was obsessive about keeping on top of all the latest scientific and tactical developments. But it’s about time we started looking to the generation of former players who have huge awareness of the way their clubs work. We need John Terry to be a future Chelsea manager, Jamie Carragher at Liverpool, Ryan Giggs or Gary Neville running Manchester United. And City could start with Vieira at the helm next season, rather than Pellegrini – who has failed – or Klopp – who will want time and money to build another side.

Manchester United will use Marouane Fellaini to target Chelsea weak spots

I think Manchester United will have one name on their minds as they run out to face Chelsea: Cesar Azpilicueta. Van Gaal’s team will go long early in the game at Stamford Bridge, because they won’t want Chelsea in their faces in the final third. And Azpilicueta is the defender I expect them to target, by getting Marouane Fellaini, such a major reason for United’s recent resurgence, to go up and “stand on him” in the first 20 minutes – creating the second-ball opportunity which Wayne Rooney, Ander Herrera and Juan Mata will look to feed on.

I expect Fellaini to target Azpilicueta (Getty)

There’s nothing wrong with Azpilicueta technically. It’s physically that United will believe they can trouble him, if he plays. The other defenders – Terry, Gary Cahill and Branislav Ivanovic – are stronger and dominant in the air, so United will leave Mourinho with a decision to make. Does he get one of the central defenders to swap with Azpilicueta and take on Fellaini, leaving a weakness at the heart of the defence? Or get one of them to help him out? Either solution will create space for United. Physicality is the key. The early stages could dictate the course of the game.

Danny Higginbotham’s autobiography, Rise of the Underdog, published by Trinity Mirror Sport, is out now (Trinity Mirror Sport Media. RRP £16.99)