At the helm of the Austrian national team since January 2018, Franco Foda impressed as the country made it to the Euro 2020 round of 16, losing to Italy in extra time.
However, their attempts to qualify to the 2022 World Cup didn’t go as planned, encountering a determined Gareth Bale along the way, who decided he would ignore his Real Madrid injuries to take his nation to a qualifying final against either Scotland or Ukraine.
Foda subsequently resigned, which now leaves Austria’s sporting director, Peter Schöttel with the task of finding his country’s football team a new manager, and he’s seemingly sought help from someone at Manchester United.
That man is none other than Ralf Rangnick, with Kurier claiming the nation’s chief ‘is currently on a three-day trip abroad’ following ‘confirmed talks with Peter Stöger last week and Andreas Herzog on Sunday’.
On said excursion, ‘there is a suspicion that he met’ the Manchester United manager, but not to try and convince him to take over, because the 63-year-old ‘will remain as a sports advisor’ with the Red Devils from the summer onwards.
Instead, it’s because Rangnick ‘not only has a great deal of experience in choosing trainers, but also a corresponding network’ and ‘one who could be recommended’ is Markus Gisdol.
The 52-year-old took over at Lokomotiv Moscow, but stepped down from his role in early March due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, making him a free agent.
Either way, ‘one can assume that RB Salzburg’s sports director Christoph Freund arranged the meeting’ between the Manchester United interim manager and Schöttel, as he ‘sits on the ÖFB sports commission and is supposed to advise’ the latter on the manager.
With him still having ‘good connections’ with Rangnick, this all makes sense.
