6 Managers You Didn't Know Were Almost Newcastle Boss

4. Ottmar Hitzfeld

As a Champions League winner and bearer of four Bundesliga title medals it doesn't take a genius to decipher why Newcastle's top brass were so keen to install Hitzfeld as the successor to Souness in 2006. Toon bosses were initially hesitant to publicly pursue the German out of fear that he would be a "difficult candidate to sell to the Newcastle public" according to the Independent. But as it turned out supporters were equally as enthusiastic about seeing the former Bayern Munich chief in the dugout, so much so that 1400 fans had scribbled their names on an online petition championing the club to appoint him ahead of Glenn Roeder, who would eventually take up the managerial reins on an interim basis for the final few months of the 2005/06 season and guide the club to seventh. Hitzfeld, regrettably, also fielded concerns of his own that were centred around the level of acceptance he would be granted in the English game on the basis of nationality and distanced himself from the Newcastle job. Shepherd subsequently turned to Roeder to fill the vacancy while Hitzfeld returned to Bayern a year later and inspired them to a fifth title under his guidance before taking over as head coach of Switzerland.