Sporting director Cristiano Guintoli has a handful of favorites as the next permanent head coach at the Bianconeri. Another mistake, like his poaching Thiago Motta, could end in him being given the boot.
Yet Fulham boss Marco Silva, who is not laden with silverware during his coaching career, strongly appeals to him.
Guintoli had a verbal agreement with Motta, while he was Bologna head coach, and Max Allegri was still the Juventus boss. It all backfired, with three-year Project Motta came crashing down after just nine months.
Should Silva join Juve and doesn’t find an immediate winning formula in Turin, then the Portuguese head coach and Guintoli would both come under immense pressure.
Bringing in Tudor, who was sacked as assistant coach with the Turin titans at the end of the 2020/21 despite winning silverware, has been a revelation by Guintoli. The Croatian, who was a defender for the Bianconeri, is extremely enthusiastic and is carving out the required results.
Interim manager Tudor has kicked off with an unbeaten run in his trio of Serie A games, but only beaten Genoa and lowly Lecce by a one-goal margin. He has been busy tweaking how his squad approaches set pieces, with the onus on creating more scoring chances.
Tudor is also improving the squad that includes bringing out the best in Kenan Yildiz, with the Turkish teenager having bagged two goals in his past three games.
Dusan Vlahovic, Tudor’s favorite Serie A striker, has yet to score under his new boss. Although he set up both goals in their edgy 2-1 home success over relegation-threatened Lecce last weekend.
Tudor has six more games to try and clinch a top four finish, which would result in a money-spinning return to the Champions League next term, but he may not be at the helm for the 2025/26 campaign.
His short-term agreement runs until 30 June, which means he could be in charge for the round-robin phase of the prestigious 2025 FIFA Club World Cup finals in June and July.
Silva is one of Juve’s back-up plans if Tudor’s season fizzles out, like it did during his short stint with Lazio last season when they narrowly missed out on qualifying for Europe.
Fulham are in the mix with an outside chance of scoring continental soccer next season, with Silva having already established the Londoners as a battling Premier League side. He joined Fulham in July 2021, and since their return to the top flight has netted finishes of 10th and 13th.
Yet Silva is in no hurry to enter talks with Fulham about extending his contract, which expires at the end of next season. He is the favorite to become the next head coach at Tottenham Hotspur, should Spurs sack Ange Postecoglou.
Spurs are only holding onto their no nonsense manager as Postecoglou has historically won a trophy in his second season, and the club remains in the Europa League. Should they fail to scoop silverware, Postecoglou is likely to be shown the exit doors.
Silva and AFC Bournemouth’s Andoni Ireola are the names strongly rumoured to be on the shortlist at Spurs, after Tottenham tasted a 17th Premier League defeat last weekend.
With Iraola able to command a bigger club than Spurs, it appears that Silva is the more likely of the pair to tackle a new challenge at Tottenham.
Silva has a €9.35million (US$10.6m) release clause in his contract at Craven Cottage, which from July drops to €7m (US$8m). However, these figures only apply to Premier League clubs.
Juventus would only have to fork out €2.35m (US$2.65m) to secure Silva. Yet Giuntoli is not likely to gamble on a manager who has only won four trophies, whose last silverware was the 2020/21 English Championship with Fulham.
A safer pair of hands for Juventus would be to bring in Roberto De Zerbi, ex-Italy chief Roberto Mancini or former Barcelona boss Xavi, who are all on Juve’s wanted list.