The surprise Welsh names leading the field to become new Cardiff City manager

When Erol Bulut was relieved from his role as Cardiff City manager yesterday, the question was quickly asked – who would replace him?

After the club recorded its worst start to a season in 94 years, which saw the Bluebirds rooted to the foot of the Championship after scoring one goal and recording one point in six games, the writing was on the wall for the Turkish manager who had only signed a new two year deal in July after leading the club to a 12th place finish in the league last season.

24 hours after Saturday’s desperately poor 2-0 defeat to Leeds United, he was sacked – with coach Omer Riza stepping in as interim manager.

Now the search is on to find a new boss at a club who have had 12 managers in 14 seasons since Vincent Tan bought the club.

If you believe the bookies then it’s two Welsh coaches who are currently touted as joint favourites for the role as the Bluebirds’ new manager.

According to Welsh bookmaker Dragonbet – former Wales boss Mark Hughes and ex-Newport County gaffer James Rowberry are the early pacesetters in the betting, with both touted as 3-1 prospects.

Wales legend Hughes has had a long managerial career, which started with Wales in 1999, and continued with Blackburn Rovers, Manchester City, Fulham, Queens Park Rangers, Stoke City, Southampton and latterly with Bradford City in 2023.

Rowberry meantime is a highly thought of young coach. His first and only managerial job was with Newport County in 2021/2022, but he has susbtantial experience with the Bluebirds as a coach under former managers Russell Slade, Paul Trollope and Neil Warnock. He also impressed many with his work at the Football Association of Wales, where he was recently appointed as a member of new boss Craig Bellamy’s coaching staff.

A name that has been mentioned a lot in the last 24 hours is Freyr Alexandersson. The highly rated Icelandic boss of Cardiff’s City’s sister side K.V. Kortrijk in the Belgian League, he has already expressed his desire to one day manage the Bluebirds, when both sides met in the Welsh capital during pre-season.

He’s rated a 7-1 shot and having kept the Belgian club in the Jupiler League after a relegation fight he’s well thought of by the Bluebirds’ hierarchy.

According to Dragonbet, current interim boss Omer Riza is at 9-1, with Charlton’s Welsh boss (and Cardiff City fan) Nathan Jones at 10-1.

At 14/1 is former Norwich, Preston and Stoke boss Alex Neil, former Rochdale manager and head of elite squad development at Manchester City, Brian Barry-Murphy and the Bluebirds’ U21 boss Darren Purse.

It wouldn’t be a Cardiff managerial hunt without former gaffer Neil Warnock mentioned, and he’s rated 16/1 by Dragonbet (that’s if wife Sharon let’s him manage another team, of course!)