Marseille have contacted Lille boss Christoph Galtier as the Newcastle United linked Andre Villas-Boas seemingly closes in on a departure from the Stade Velodrome, according to Le10 Sport.
One of the biggest clubs in French football are already under pressure to raise £100 million to avoid potential Financial Fair Play sanctions, meaning they may have no choice but to cash in on four or five first-team stars (Le10).
So the last thing Marseille needed was to see a boss who has guided them into the Champions League for the first time in seven years head for the exit.
Villas-Boas joined L’OM on a low ebb last summer, via a brief foray into motorsports once his reputation in the dugout had hit rock bottom. 12 months on, however, a man who famously led Porto to the treble at the age of just 33 appears to be on his way back to the top of the European game.
Newcastle are keen to hand a man popularly known as AVB a third spell in England, according to FootMercato, with Steve Bruce seemingly hanging on to his dream job by his fingernails.
And with Marseille’s sporting director, the former Barcelona goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta, announcing his departure on Friday morning, it seems only a matter of time before Villas-Boas follows in his wake with everything up in the air once again at Ligue 1’s perennial crisis-club.
The manager and the director had an excellent relationship after all, as ESPN points out.
Le10 Sport claims that Marseille president Jacques-Henri Eyraud has held talks with experienced Lille boss Galtier about the prospect of replacing the Portuguese tactician in Southern France.
So while the prospect of AVB taking over at Newcastle still feels slim, his seemingly inevitable departure will still get fans talking on Tyneside.
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