Mauricio Pochettino has long seemed destined to take charge of Man Utd and he is finally about to see that turn into reality.

It can be easy to accuse Manchester United of living in the past, but sometimes the most obvious criticisms are also the most accurate ones. As their search for a new head coach comes to an end, club chiefs have turned to someone they rejected in 2019 and 2022.

It's a parable of the modern-day Manchester United. They might not be going for a club legend now, but they are going for a head coach they should have appointed earlier, only to pass over him twice when his stock was higher than it is now.

Going for Mauricio Pochettino looks like the right call this time. He is the best of the available candidates, but that says more about the people he has beaten to the job than it does about the 54-year-old Argentine.

When your other alternatives were someone burnt out by an up-and-down spell at Newcastle and a head coach who failed with Bayern Munich and Germany, you don't really have to stand out to convince Omar Berrada and Jason Wilcox that you might just be the right man this time.

It's too early to say Pochettino's best days are behind him. He came into the management game young and should have plenty of road ahead of him. He might be a better head coach for the varied experiences he's had.

His reputation rose again this summer when his USA team shone at a home World Cup, only for Donald Trump's interference to provide added inspiration to a fired-up Belgium side. But Pochettino had more access to his USA players than any other head coach in the lead-up to the tournament, and therefore more time to gel them together, taking advantage over other, less well-prepared nations.

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And the reality is that he hasn't worked in the club game for two-and-a-half seasons now, and his zenith was a while ago. You could argue that he peaked in 2018/19, when he dragged Tottenham to the Champions League final, and has been on the decline since.

Certainly, that spell with Spurs is where he made his name, and the club has never been the same since, which is why supporters have hankered after his return at various points in the last seven years.

For Pochettino, taking the Paris Saint-Germain job in January 2021, after 14 months out of work, was a mistake. His high-intensity approach was never the right fit for a squad that was at its most disruptive and just didn't have the players willing to make the sacrifices required to make it work.

His time in charge at Chelsea also ended after one season, and once again it was probably a mistake to take the job, even if there was a sense he was starting to get it to click at the end of his tenure. After those bruising experiences, taking the USA job was a change of pace and a chance to take stock, and he did look re-energised during the World Cup.

But at the highest level in the club game, he has been in charge of a club for just two-and-a-half years since his Tottenham sacking, which was seven years ago next week. That is a lot of time away from the coalface.

Perhaps the break will have done him good, and the United job has always looked a better fit for him than PSG or Chelsea. He missed out to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in 2019 and Erik ten Hag in 2022, but now looks like making it third time lucky.

Even during the World Cup, he joked with long-term assistant Jesus Perez about the No.2's affection for Manchester. “One day, your dream comes true!” Pochettino told Perez. “You go to Manchester United!”

Now it looks like they will arrive together. Pochettino touched on his previous flirtations with the club in an interview with FourFourTwo ahead of the World Cup.

"United have always shown interest, but the ideal scenario to manage there has never quite materialised," he said.

Now it is all coming together, but the question is whether the phrase better late than never can hold true this time.