West Ham United have already made moves to sound out potential candidates to replace Manuel Pellegrini in readiness to sack the Chilean if his team lose to Southampton.

West Ham travel to St Mary’s on Saturday evening on the back of seven defeats in 10 Premier League matches and one more against relegation strugglers Southampton is expected to mark the end for Pellegrini.

Having been considering his position for a number of weeks, the east London club have had time to find out which managers might be available to either take over on an interim or long-term basis.

West Ham have tried to give Pellegrini time to turn results around and have wanted him to succeed, but they cannot afford to wait so long that the situation gets much worse.

Everton’s failure to appoint an interim or permanent replacement for Marco Silva has complicated matters slightly for West Ham, as David Moyes, who is keen to return to Goodison Park, is on their list of possible appointments.