Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has revealed that he would like Serbian Dragan Stojkovic to replace him at the Emirates once he retires from the game.
As a player, Stojkovic was on the books for Red Star Belgrade and Marseille, while he also enjoyed a long international career as captain of Yugoslavia. Now, the man nicknamed Piksi (Pixie), is managing Wenger’s former club Nagoya Grampus Eight and has impressed the Frenchman.
Wenger told Serbian paper Vecernje Novosti: “I would love Stojkovic to be my successor, there are a hundred reasons for that.
”Our ideas are the same and we both strive for perfect football. I knew he was going to have teams playing attacking football with many passes… He has done that, showing he will be a great coach. I told him that if he could transmit his football imagination to his players he would fly high.”
Stojkovic won the J-League title with Nagoya last season and also played under Wenger when he coached the Japanese side in 1995. The Frenchman revealed that the pair are very close friends: “Dragan comes to London at least once a year,” Wenger confirmed. “We meet up, chat and try to outsmart each other. It’s a great achievement for him to have won a championship. I was a coach in Japan for two years and didn’t manage it even though I had Piksi, who was the best player in the league, in my team.”
Wenger signed a new contract at the club in August, keeping him in London until 2014, although he admitted it could be his last: ”At 65 I will certainly move to some different job, unless I still feel like I feel today.”
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