Kieran McKenna is a smart man. So why would he get involved in the risky business of the weirdos at Man United and Chelsea?

To apply some context to what has made Kieran McKenna so popular in recent times, one has to travel a decent distance into the past to find the last manager who made the same magnificent leap through the divisions. That would be Nigel Adkins and it might be an idea to ask him about the thanks he received for that.

Once upon a time, he was a brilliant young man. Like McKenna, he was emotionally intelligent and tactically strong. And like McKenna at Ipswich, Adkins found an unfavorable table when he embarked on the peculiar business of sporting miracles in September 2010 – Southampton were 22nd in League One.

That simply wouldn’t do for a club with good infrastructure and listed as favorites to go up under Alan Pardew a few weeks earlier. But what an adventure they had – led by Adkins, then aged 45, Southampton went up automatically eight months later. League One being League One, it got some attention but not much.

The same goes for when they only signed three players and lost Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain to Arsenal before their next push. We mostly thought mid-table would be decent, as far as we thought about it. But it happened very differently – Southampton never got out of the top two and played sweet football all the way to the Premier League. How we loved the Adkins yarn back then, for what good it did him.

With Southampton’s results trending in the right direction and 15th in the top flight, Adkins was sacked in January 2013 and replaced by a brighter, younger player – Mauricio Pochettino.

Nigel Adkins embarked on a miraculous journey similar to McKenna, taking Southampton from League One to the Premier League in consecutive seasons between 2010 and 2012.

McKenna worked wonders at Ipswich, returning them to the top flight after 22 years

Adkins is now 59 and manages Tranmere Rovers in League Two, with most of the intervening period spent in League One and the Championship. It’s been a great, honest career for an honest, honest guy who remains the only manager I’ve known to recite Dale Wimbrow’s poetry in times of stress. But if there’s a message for McKenna in Adkins’ experience, it would be that the risks of staying put can be just as uncertain as those that accompany a big move.

Given his willingness to talk to other clubs, we know McKenna is ready to strike as his iron glows red. That is to say, he is prepared, at 38, to stake a big, new reputation on weirdos whose crackpot character is no surprise at this point, if we excuse Brighton from this conversation.

Naturally, this is where the likes of Manchester United and Chelsea come in, as they seem to have reached the Baldrick Stadium of the Blackadder episode, where the current plan seems to be the one reserved for after the pencils up the nose don’t work.

According to sources well placed to know, their interest was less diligently maintained than at Brighton. The latter have had McKenna in their sights for almost a year.

They observed it, studied it, mentioned it regularly in successive conversations, from the time when Roberto De Zerbi still shone a halo. They are sensible like that and have developed the habit of doing things well out of necessity. Whatever United and Chelsea may claim, their fascination doesn’t seem to come from such a deep place, which tells us a lot about two strange clubs trapped in strange times. There are no original observations to be made about “today’s” football culture. We know it. But in the last few years of the Premier League, has there been a more bizarre intersection between the arcs of a talented man on the rise and two desperate, slippery giants reduced to promise?

In United’s case, the escalation of their interest was reported on Thursday, which coincidentally happened to be around the time the remarkable story of Carlo Acutis and his posthumous sainthood was emerging. If you’re not familiar with the details, the Catholic Church obviously has a way to investigate miracles and a threshold for determining how many you need for canonization: if two of them you are awarded after you die, you are in the club. For United and Chelsea, it was two great seasons at Portman Road.

That they would even consider this path is surreal and perhaps alarming for such decisive phases of their respective regimes.

United’s upcoming managerial appointment is Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s biggest decision yet at Old Trafford; for the Boehly-Eghbali axis of calamity, they must show that there was coherent thought in the “mutual” aspect of their divorce from Pochettino.

Todd Boehly (center) and Behdad Eghbali (second right) want McKenna at Chelsea

However, Sir Jim Ratcliffe (right) will fight to bring the Ipswich boss to Manchester United

Within these parameters one has to wonder how thick the line between courageous and reckless is, such is the combustible, stifling and changeable environment they consider appropriate for a manager without top-flight equipment under his belt . It’s an incredibly wild game of chance.

None of this is an insult to McKenna. He did a fantastic job at Ipswich. And Ipswich have done a fantastic job with him. Together, they have climbed at a speed we thought improbable to a stage where parachute payments have closed much of the Championship shop.

For McKenna, the risk of leaving would be greater than for United or Chelsea. Clubs emerge from a fire; a burned manager often stays burned, especially the youngest. We can assume that supporting United as a boy, and then working there as a man, would make him particularly susceptible to the heat at the club he supposedly favors.

A great dilemma to have, without a doubt. And well done to him for winning it – who knows, he might even be the miracle two clubs dream of. But he’s a smart man, because it takes a smart man to navigate from League One to these discussions. Just like an intelligent man might see the pencils in a few of these noses and seriously wonder if bigger is better.

For McKenna, the risk of leaving would be greater than for United or Chelsea.

Don’t count on Novak’s decline

When the end comes in sport, it can often be predicted in alarming ways. For this reason, it might be tempting to read a lot into Novak Djokovic’s third set cover-up against Tomas Machac on Friday and his continued failure to win a title in 2024.

It would also be misplaced wishful thinking for those who wish to speed up the changing of the guard.

Even if his 37-year-old legs start to lose some spring, that spirit will be worth at least three games in each set when the Grand Slams come into play.

It would be inappropriate wishful thinking to dismiss Serbian star Novak Djokovic.

Rooney’s fight

When we talk about the prevailing desire to go big and go fast, there is something deliciously heartwarming about Wayne Rooney taking over at Plymouth.

He may never succeed in management, which took the opposite path he took as a player. But his willingness to give up and fight is still there and deeply admirable when simpler ways to find purpose wait on a broadcaster’s couch.

There is something deliciously heartwarming about Wayne Rooney taking over at Plymouth.