Casey Stoney, Nick Cushing and 10 candidates to replace Jonas Eidevall at Arsenal – ranked

After Arsenal’s poor start to the season continued with defeat to Chelsea on Saturday, Jonas Eidevall handed in his resignation and waved farewell to the club that he has coached for the last three years. In terms of the Women’s Super League title race, it was always going to be difficult for the Gunners to recover from dropping seven points in their opening four games to be a genuine contender. That task is now complicated by the club looking for the perfect replacement for the Swede.

Plenty of names have been touted by fans and pundits since Eidevall’s departure was announced on Tuesday and the intrigue around who his successor will be is only increased by the fact that no name has yet emerged as a genuine favourite – though one rather significant one has been ruled out.

Eidevall’s replacement doesn’t just have to be a top coach with winning experience, either. Arsenal is a club that is associated with a particular way of playing the game and that is something that will be a significant factor as the hierarchy set about making this appointment.

With that in mind, who are the most suitable candidates for the vacant managerial role? GOAL takes a look…

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  10Martin Ho

  Arsenal looked to Scandinavia for Eidevall, could they look there again for his replacement? After building quite a strong reputation for himself as the assistant coach at Manchester United, Englishman Martin Ho has only enhanced that since taking over Norwegian side Brann.

  Many were impressed with how Ho set up his team in last season’s Champions League campaign, in which they won four of six group stage matches and only lost 5-3 on aggregate to reigning – and eventual – champions Barcelona in the quarter-finals. Brann didn’t just sit back in a low block against big teams. They were as adventurous as they could be without shooting themselves in the foot and showed moments of real positivity on the attack, which helped secure a particularly impressive 2-2 draw against Lyon, the eight-time winners.

  However, it does feel like more experience as a head coach would be beneficial for Ho before he is ready for a job like Arsenal. At 34 years old, he does appear to be on the right track.

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    9Carla Ward

    Carla Ward has gradually progressed through the women’s game in the last few years, doing an impressive job with second-tier Sheffield United, guiding relegation favourites Birmingham City to safety in the top-flight and then helping Aston Villa secure a best-ever finish in the WSL.

    After leaving Villa at the end of last season, Ward added another impressive experience to her CV by spending the summer as part of Emma Hayes’ staff on the United States women’s national team at the Olympic Games as they won a gold medal. She will have learned so much from that time in France.

    However, while she’s clearly a very promising young English coach, it feels like there is another step for Ward to take before she secures a job like the one at Arsenal, as it’s a big gap from Villa.

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    8Tony Gustavsson

    Could this vacancy be the one that brings Tony Gustavsson back to club football? The 51-year-old has a lot of impressive experience, having been assistant coach of the United States women’s national team for an Olympic gold medal and back-to-back World Cup triumphs. In the club game, he also led a star-studded Tyreso side to a first Damallsvenskan title and the 2013-14 Women’s Champions League final, where they were only defeated 4-3 by reigning champions Wolfsburg.

    It’s hard to pinpoint whether or not Gustavsson would fit Arsenal’s philosophy, in terms of the players he would best utilise and the style he would implement, because it’s 10 years since he worked for a significant period in the club game, which is much less restrictive than international football. There were positives from his most recent job with Australia, as evidenced by semi-finals at the Olympics and World Cup, but also questions raised about how his team eventually lost their way at this year’s Games.

    If Gustavsson does decide to come back into the club game, it’ll certainly be interesting to see how he fares. However, while not impossible, a move to Arsenal leans more on the unlikely side of the scale.

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    7Renee Slegers

    Renee Slegers is different to most coaches that take up interim roles because she has significant experience as a head coach, making her a more realistic candidate for the full-time role than the temporary fixes often are. When Eidevall left Rosengard back in 2021 to join Arsenal, it was Slegers who took over. In two full seasons, she secured back-to-back Damallsvenskan titles, won the Swedish Cup and reached a Champions League quarter-final.

    Whether or not she emerges as a serious contender for the Arsenal job depends on a few things. One is whether or not the club wants something quite different to Eidevall and, following that, how similar the Gunners’ hierarchy believe Slegers is to the former boss. While she is her own coach with her own philosophies, she has worked in his staff for two stints now, having also done so at Rosengard.

    As interim, Slegers has the opportunity to influence the latter. Sensibly, she didn’t make many changes in her first game in charge, opting for consistency given the circumstances. But the longer she is in the dugout, the more she will be able to make a bit of a mark. The question is whether she’ll be there long enough to really show the coach she is, or whether Arsenal find an external candidate they really like quite quickly.

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    6Mark Parsons

    For a long time, Mark Parsons was regarded as one of the best coaches in the women’s game. After cutting his teeth at the Washington Spirit, the Englishman enjoyed a remarkable four-year stint with the Portland Thorns, winning a major title every season. His teams always had one of the best defensive records in the league and they managed to achieve that without sacrificing too much in attack, remaining among the NWSL’s top-scorers each year.

    However, things haven’t gone particularly well for Parsons since he left that role in 2021. An opportunity with the Netherlands looked exciting, but he ultimately seemed to lack chemistry with a squad used to coaches who were to the point, and his return to the U.S. with the Spirit was disappointing, his only season ending without a playoff finish.

    With the right fit, this title-winning coach can bring success to a club again. Is that club Arsenal? He feels more suitable than others.

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    5Nick Cushing

    There are a lot of reasons why Nick Cushing would be a good choice as Arsenal’s next head coach. When Manchester City became a professional top-flight team, he was the man tasked with building a title-winning team from the ground up and he certainly did that, departing in 2020 having won four major honours, including the WSL, and having reached two Champions League semi-finals. He has the credentials.

    However, there is a style of play Arsenal are associated with and one has to doubt whether or not Cushing would suit the club in that sense. At Man City, he was an adaptable manager, one happy to play more on the counter and allow the opponent to dictate possession if it would increase the chances of success.

    There is also the factor of his current job. Cushing has been head coach of MLS side New York City since the start of the 2023 season and he appears to be building something good there. It feels like it would have to be an attractive proposition to pull him away from that, if indeed Arsenal – or any other club, for that matter – was interested in his services.

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    4Casey Stoney

    When Eidevall’s departure was announced, one of the first names that came to mind for most as the next Arsenal coach was Casey Stoney. A former player, and thus someone who knows all about the demands of the club, Stoney helped guide Manchester United to the top-flight, developed them into a team that could mix it with the WSL’s elite and then enjoyed impressive success in the U.S. with the San Diego Wave, winning two major titles in two seasons before being surprisingly sacked midway through her third.

    It’s fair to say that Arsenal forward Alessia Russo enjoyed the best form of her career to date when playing for Stoney at Man Utd, and reuniting the England star with a coach who appears to know exactly how to play to her strengths would be one of the most attractive things about appointing her.

    Stoney also has a reputation for making her teams defensively strong, which Arsenal could certainly use given how frequently they have been leaking goals as of late. However, there are questions about whether she could also bring the expansive style of play to the table that Arsenal, as a club, demands. Stoney’s success as a manager to date has been built on strong foundations rather than mesmerising attacking play.

    Regardless, BBC Sport has somewhat surprisingly reported that Arsenal are not currently considering Stoney for the role, despite the Times understanding that the former England defender would be open to the opportunity and her various suitable traits.

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    3Laura Harvey

    Twelve years on from her three-season stint as Arsenal head coach, could Laura Harvey return to north London following Eidevall’s exit? She’s certainly someone who knows the club well, having spent two years in various roles before taking over the first team, with whom she delivered six major honours before departing for the United States.

    Across the pond, Harvey’s success has continued. The three-time NWSL Coach of the Year has won three NWSL Shields across two spells with the Seattle Reign – which have been separated by time in charge of the Utah Royals and the U.S. Under-20 women’s national team.

    While the NWSL Championship continues to elude Harvey and Seattle, with them finishing runners-up again last year, it will always feel like the pair have unfinished business together. But could the coach be tempted by a new challenge after so long in the NWSL? She can play exciting football and has the pedigree and the experience to be a fit for Arsenal, again.

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    2Lluis Cortes

    An attractive playing style? A manager who has won big titles? Lluis Cortes ticks both of those boxes. The former Barcelona boss led the Catalans to their first Women’s Champions League crown back in 2021 and may have since fallen off the radar for some, due to rather left-field spells in charge of the women’s national teams in Ukraine and, now, Saudi Arabia.

    Cortes only signed his contract with the latter back in December 2023 and it is one that runs until 2027, so it would not be cheap to buy him out of. Furthermore, would his head be turned by another job, so soon into this one? It seems an unlikely move but there’s no doubt that he would suit the job at Arsenal.

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    1Alessandro Spugna

    If Arsenal want a coach who can win titles and also play a brand of football that suits the club, what about Alessandro Spugna? The 50-year-old has done an absolutely brilliant job with Roma since taking over in 2021, helping them to usurp Juventus as the dominant force in Italian women’s football – and in style.

    After finishing second in his first season in charge, Roma have since won back-to-back Serie A titles, Coppa Italia and the Italian Super Cup, all while asserting themselves on the European stage much more quickly than most would’ve anticipated. Spugna’s bold, attacking style has made it all remarkably entertaining, too, and he and his staff have cooperated brilliantly to ensure every signing suits what he wants to do to a tee.

    Everything about Roma – the success, the style of play, the make-up of the squad – feels at least similar to what Arsenal would like to strive towards, and Spugna has been central to it all. His name has not been mentioned much with regards to the Gunners’ vacancy but it’s hard to pick out flaws that would stop him being a great fit, if considered.