The Stamford Bridge dugout will have its third incumbent this season in Bruno Saltor starting Tuesday, when Chelsea host Liverpool. Saltor, who was an assistant coach under the recently departed Graham Potter, has been appointed as interim manager until the end of the season.
Bruno, as he’s commonly known, was the senior development coach in Potter’s backroom staff at Brighton & Hove Albion for three years and made the move to West London with him last September.
Bruno made 235 appearances for Brighton as a right-back, after joining them from Valencia in 2012, and captained the side to Premier League promotion in 2017. He went on to make 39 top flight appearances before retiring at the end of the 2018/19 season.
The status and regard in which he’s held by the fanbase is best reflected by the mural that went up in his honour in the city centre in November 2019.
Potter swiftly added Bruno to his backroom team after arriving on the South Coast in 2019. From training to strategy to team selection, Bruno’s responsibilities were widespread. On match days, he was positioned up in the stands and would share his insights with Potter and the team at half-time.
The journey from the stands to the touchline marks a remarkable progression for the Spaniard; the game against Liverpool will be his first ever in the managerial hot-seat.
It’s going to be a baptism by fire for Bruno. Six of his 10 Premier League games in charge come against sides above Chelsea in the table, including trips to Arsenal and Manchester City. And, then there’s the small matter of Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter-finals.
A bald 42-year-old assistant taking charge mid-season of a Chelsea side struggling in the league; it’s a story we’ve heard before. Bruno will be hoping to evoke the spirit of Roberto Di Matteo as he plots a Champions League triumph that feels unlikely and yet very ‘Chelsea’.
He now becomes the fifth interim manager of the Premier League season, following Aaron Danks (Aston Villa), Steve Davis (Wolves), Michael Skubala (Leeds), Gary O’Neil (Bournemouth) and Ruben Selles (Southampton). Interim managers have overseen a total of 32 games this season and registered only 11 wins.
While Potter’s firing is in line with the carousel-belt nature of managerial change at Chelsea, the lack of a successor-in-waiting is striking. Barring Ray Wilkins’ and Steve Holland’s solitary games in charge in 2008 and 2015, Bruno is the first assistant since Di Matteo to be appointed manager for an extended period.
