The Bristol City management saga took another twist this evening, as talkSPORT’s Alex Crook reports that Tommy Elphick has rejected the job in order to remain with Bournemouth.
Elphick was understood to be the preferred candidate at Ashton Gate, having got to the final two alongside Michael Skubala. At the tail end of last week, it was reported that the Robins had chosen to go with Elphick, who was set to leave Bournemouth at the same time as Andoni Iraola.
That seemed to fit with the delay in naming a new boss, as the weekend rolled in, and the final game of the Premier League season. Michael Skubala appeared on Sky TV and seemingly suggested he was looking forward to next season with the Imps, amid reports of him being set to pen a new deal.
It’s now being reported that Elphick is wanted at Dean Court, as part of Marco Rose’s backroom staff. The German boss, last in charge of RB Leipzig, is set to take over from Iraola, who guided the Cherries to sixth in the Premier League last season, and a place in the Europa League.
That does seemingly leave Bristol City with a problem, given how open their recruitment process seems to have been. Whether by design or by accident, their hunt for a manager has played out very openly in the media, with reports linking Michael and Portsmouth boss John Mousinho surfacing through agent-led journalists as early as the first week in May.
Three weeks later, and their process has had more airtime than most Championship jobs get, and the optics are slowly getting worse. If Elphick has turned them down, their options are to either approach Michael or to go to a third candidate. If they’ve already said ‘thanks, but no thanks’ to our head coach, it might be that they face a second rejection.
The Robins are currently restructuring, having not only replaced the manager but also their technical director, Brian Tinnion. That led to James Ellis being appointed, a friend of Michael’s from his Loughborough days, but the managerial saga playing out so openly, and if Elphick is staying put, so disasterously, does provide some very bad optics for the start of their new era.
A week ago, it seemed they were close to making an appointment, and yet here we are, seven days later, with reports suggesting their number one target has turned them down. The next 48 hours will be very interesting.