Cardiff City candidate 'would love' to manage club after already rescuing Vincent Tan

So, here we are again, with Cardiff City on the lookout for another new manager.

Erol Bulut was given his marching orders on Sunday following the 2-0 defeat by Leeds United on the weekend, a result which further cements Cardiff's position at the bottom of the Championship table after six games.

Five defeats and a draw, plus only one goal, makes for damning reading. The positive is, we are still only six games in and there are 40 to go. Let's not forget, Nottingham Forest were bottom of the table after eight games before Steve Cooper took over there and steered them to promotion that very season.

READ MORE: Vincent Tan's order and Ken Choo's phone call - how Erol Bulut was sacked by Cardiff City

READ MORE: Cardiff City next manager odds as Schumacher early favourite and ex players linked

The same is unlikely to happen at Cardiff, of course, but the point is the job is an attractive one and the squad is far better than what it has showed so far. So, who will be the man to take the helm next? Who will be Vincent Tan's 12th permanent manager of the Bluebirds?

It was no secret that Bulut was chairman Mehmet Dalman's man. It is likely Dalman, who went in to bat for Bulut throughout the summer, convinced he could build on what was broadly deemed a positive year last year, will now take a step back, with Ken Choo, the chief executive likely to have a far greater say in proceedings.

Owner Tan tends to favour younger managers with fresh ideas. Also, given he will have to fork out a pretty penny for Bulut, who was sacked just three months after he signed a new two-year deal, it would be a surprise to see him release the purse strings too much.

The notion of him poaching a manager from another team he owns, therefore, has some grounding in logic. And KV Kortrijk manager Freyr Alexandersson has already made his feelings clear on the Bluebirds' managerial post.

Speaking to Fotbolti earlier this summer, amid a delay in handing Bulut a new contract, the 41-year-old said: “Vincent Tan and Ken Choo look after both clubs. It's no secret, and when I spoke to Kortrijk at the time, I also had a conversation with the management of Cardiff that I'm going to train in England. I'm going to be a manager in the Championship or the Premier League.

"There are big dreams and I realise that. It would be great if it was Cardiff, I would love to coach Cardiff at some point."

Alexandersson is seen as a relegation-escape specialist. While Cardiff are by no means at that level yet, having that on your CV given what has come in recent seasons in the Welsh capital is no bad thing. Sign up to our Cardiff City newsletter here.

The Icelandic former centre-back was recruited by Kortrijk back in January after impressive work in Denmark with Lyngby Boldklub.

He arrived in Lyngby in 2021 and steered the club to a second-placed finish in his first season, achieving promotion to the Danish top flight. He was also praised for his work in keeping them in the top flight the following year.

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Alexandersson, who was KVK's third manager last year during a rotten season, will have curried favour with Tan and Choo after saving the Belgian club from relegation last term, with Tan's club looking nailed on for the drop at one stage. The manager also revealed earlier this month that that Belgian club Royale Union Saint-Gilloise tried to poach him in the summer, but a deal never got over the line.

While KVK is, of course, in Tan's football club portfolio, along with FK Sarajevo, Cardiff City is clearly the jewel in that particular crown. The links between Cardiff and KVK, whose CEO is also the Bluebirds' CEO in Ken Choo, appeared to grow stronger this season after a failed sale of the club last year, with the Welsh club utilising the Belgian side to help give players game time – see Isaak Davies and Ryotaro Tsunoda last season and Roko Simic this term.

Alexandersson is certainly not a name to rule out at this stage.

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