Abramovich has run out of managers to sack and options to replace Benitez



I was asked which club I would have liked to have played for if I had ever moved abroad and left Manchester United.



And my first instinctive reaction was Bayern Munich, followed by Juventus.

The Bundesliga club had always impressed me when I played against them with Manchester United.

It was the little details that told you everything about the professionalism of the club. Like the team bus.

Out of time: Roman Abramovich may be stuck with Rafa Benitez

Cold reception: Rafa Benitez is struggling to win over the supporters at Chelsea

They would always have their team bus, wherever they went. Most clubs, when they fly abroad, borrow a bus to get them from the airport to the hotel and stadium. Not Bayern Munich.



Their bus driver would set off three or four days before the match, driving across countries, catching ferries, so that when the team arrived, their bus would be at the airport waiting for them.

It was that attention to detail which so impressed me.

When I spoke to Owen Hargreaves about the club at which he grew up during the Oliver Kahn, Steffen Effenburg era, you got a sense of the mentality that is bred into people at Bayern Munich.



So while I was surprised when they announced this week that Pep Guardiola was their new manager, I shouldn't have been.

In many ways it's a perfect fit. It's presented as a huge coup for Bayern, which it is, but I would almost go as far to suggest that Guardiola has got the better of the deal.



Here is a coach with an almost unblemished reputation, who in his four years of management has won almost every trophy available while his teams have played some of the greatest football we've seen.



So to choose a club of such stature, with stability, an emphasis on bringing through young players and crucially, one that is run by former professionals, great names like Franz Beckenbauer, Uli Hoeness and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, executives who have true appreciation and understanding of the game.

And it was impossible not to wonder whether this was the week when Roman Abramovich got his comeuppance. At times he seems to have been bent on creating a Utopian football team set up for Guardiola to manage.

It's as though he's been saying: 'I'm getting rid of all these old players for you; I'm signing Eden Hazard, Oscar and Juan Mata and I've got Fernando Torres, who's Spanish, for you; I'm making a team for you. Come and manage my club.' And Guardiola has given an emphatic: 'No.'



Time to move: Pep Guardiola (left) turned Abramovich down which may give Benitez (right) more time at Chelsea than many were expecting

He's had the foresight and sense to stay off Abramovich's carousel. Because he knows that if he manages Chelsea, then he's going to be tainted at some point.

There is no doubt that it will end in confrontation eventually and that his reputation would be dented.



And anyway, having managed Barcelona, one of the great clubs in Europe, it's natural that he would want to be at one of the traditional powers of the game.

People always talk about who will succeed Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United.



Well, I don't think he will give up for many a year, as I don't see any sign of him waning on the job.



However, by taking the Bayern job this week, Guardiola preserved his position as a potential candidate for United when Sir Alex does eventually retire.



The minute he had gone to Chelsea or Manchester City he would likely have ruled himself out of the job in English football he would probably most want to do.



And when you look at Abramovich and his nine and a half years at Chelsea, it's almost as though he has invented a proto-type for a new computer game: it's not so much Championship Manager as Championship Chairman.



Revolving door: (clockwise) Mourinho, Grant, Hiddink and Scolari





He's veered from appointing the best up-and-coming young manager in Jose Mourinho to a friend in Avram Grant, to a World Cup-winning Brazilian in Luiz Felipe Scolari, back to another friend in Guus Hiddink, to a Champions League legend as player and manager in Carlo Ancelotti, back to the best up-and-coming manager in Andre Villas-Boas, to a club favourite in Roberto Di Matteo and ending up at Rafa Benitez, who the fans don't like.



Shown the door: Ancelotti (left) and Villas-Boas (right), with Di Matteo below



So where does he go now?

If you were a headhunter drawing up a short-list for managers next season and didn't know the history of the club, where would you look? The best in Spain?

Well Tito Vilanova's not going to leave Barcelona so you would have to look at Mourinho. But you've sacked him.

In England, you'll never get Sir Alex or Arsene Wenger and you'll never buy out Roberto Mancini at Manchester City.



So which manager is third in the league right now? Well, that's Benitez. You've already got him.



What about fourth? That's Villas-Boas. But you've sacked him.

Look to France and who is manager of their biggest club, Paris St Germain - a man with enormous pedigree in the game? Ancelotti. But you've sacked him.

Look further abroad then.

Who is manager of the most successful nation in football history, Brazil? Who has been entrusted with that nation's most important campaign, the 2014 World Cup, which they will host? That's Scolari.

But you've sacked him.

Sound of silence: Benitez (right) not liked by Chelsea fans but he has to play Torres (left)

The reality is Chelsea will never be stable until Abramovich is the manager.



Because if you don't do what he wants - if you don't play Torres, if you don't phase out the older players, if you don't play attractive football - you're probably going to be sacked anyway.



The stories we used to hear about and laugh about from Italy 20 years ago, such as the owner turning up at the training ground and addressing the players, suggesting to the manager how to play and deciding who to sign, have become a reality.

It's an incredible way to run a club.

It has brought success - but at a price.



You can't help wondering what might have happened if they had stuck with Mourinho in 2007. Or stayed with Ancelotti in 2011.



So if you're one of the few pedigree managers left that might be available and is as yet untried at Chelsea - Jurgen Klopp at Borussia Dortmund or Diego Simeone at Atletico Madrid - then you'd be worried.



Chelsea might be coming for you.



And with that comes a degree of grief that means you might be better off elsewhere, just as Pep Guardiola decided last week.



