Former Birmingham City and West Brom defender linked with Championship manager vacancy
A Championship club parted company with their manager on Sunday, and a former Midlands football defender is among those listed to replace him.
Former Birmingham City and West Brom defender Darren Purse is being linked with the latest managerial vacancy in the EFL Championship.
Cardiff City parted company with manager Erol Bulut on Sunday following a winless start to the campaign. The Bluebirds have failed to win in their opening six matches, scoring just once, and it has meant they have made their worst start to a season in 94 years.
Omer Riza, who was brought in to the club in the summer, was given the role on an interim basis. The 44-year-old has had experience manging Cheshunt in the non-league, as well as Leyton Orient, and before joining Cardiff, he had held various roles at Watford.
According to the BBC, Cardiff are expecting 'significant interest' in the role, and the fact Riza has been appointed as interim rather than caretaker manager perhaps suggests they will take their time in making their appointment.
Their next manager could be staring them right in the face however, as in the long list of candidates for the role following the markets opening up, is Darren Purse who has been placed as sixth favourite with bookmaker DragonBet. The 47-year-old is currently the under-21s boss at Cardiff, and has been at the club for the last three years, and previously the club have promote under-21s managers, such as Steve Morison.
Should Cardiff consider him for the post, it would be his first job in senior management, having managed their stars of the future. Purse had a lengthy playing career, and a large chunk of that was spent at Birmingham City.
He joined Blues in 1998 for £600,000 plus Kevin Francis, and ended up captaining them, making 200 appearances in total. Purse departed St Andrew's in 2004, joining West Brom, but his time there was short, as he would later be sold to Cardiff City, where he played more than 120 times.
The other big clubs in his career would be Sheffield Wednesday and Millwall before winding down his career in the non-league. Since 2018, he's been involved in coaching, moving from under-16s coach at Oxford United to under-21s boss at Cardiff.