Real Madrid have moved quickly to name \u00c1lvaro Arbeloa as first-team manager on what the club reportedly treated as a short-term arrangement. Arbeloa, promoted from the Castilla role, was immediately appointed and is believed to have been offered a one-year deal. The club have also made clear that poor results in the second half of the 2025\u201326 season would leave Arbeloa vulnerable to dismissal.<\/p>\n
Behind the scenes, Real Madrid have apparently prepared contingency plans. Sky Sport Germany reports that J\u00fcrgen Klopp and Enzo Maresca sit on a list of long-term candidates should the club need to recruit a new manager in the summer. The same outlet says Maresca replaced the \u201cpreferred\u201d Zinedine Zidane in internal thinking, with Zidane widely expected to take over the France national team after the 2026 FIFA World Cup.<\/p>\n
Klopp, currently Red Bull\u2019s Head of Global Soccer, is described as someone who would \u201cseriously consider\u201d an approach should P\u00e9rez come knocking. The German himself has confirmed there have been \u201cno talks\u201d between the two parties since the coverage surfaced. Klopp also insisted Alonso\u2019s departure has \u201cabsolutely nothing to do with [him],\u201d while remaining one of the best managers currently unattached, to another club\u2019s touchline, at least.<\/p>\n
The former Liverpool manager, aged 58, stepped down from Anfield ahead of the 2024\u201325 season after a trophy-laden spell that included seven trophies, among them a Premier League title and a Champions League title. He has repeatedly struck down reports that he would like to resume a managerial career.<\/p>\n
Fabrizio Romano has added that the German has \u201cmany fans\u201d at Real Madrid and is \u201cappreciated internally.\u201d Romano also reports that the club would \u201conly consider\u201d Klopp if he makes the first move and decides to return to coaching. For now, Arbeloa will lead the team and the club will assess performance over the coming months before deciding whether to pursue a higher-profile appointment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Real Madrid weigh long-term options: Arbeloa installed, Klopp and Enzo Maresca on shortlist. in 2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5994,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[987,1397],"tags":[1087],"class_list":["post-5995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-real-madrid","category-transfer-news","tag-coaching-change"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}