According to US outlet, FieldLevelMedia, Marti Cifuentes is close to be appointed manager of Portland Timbers. He will replace interim manager Tom Cassidy. The Timbers last permanent manager was Phil Neville. Neville left the position On May 25, after a 3-1 loss at home vs. San Jose Earthquakes.
The former Leicester manager, leaving his position at Leicester in January, will know move his focus to a new continent. Cifuentes having previous experience from managing clubs in England, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Spain.
This will be a completely new adventure, but something is very similar from him taking charge at Leicester. He will replace a former Man Utd player with a legendary stature as well as a having a proud full international career.
Phil Neville played 263 league games for Man Utd, as well as being capped 59 times for England. When taking charge at Leicester, another iconic football from Man Utd stepped down, Ruud van Nistelrooy. The playing career of the Dutch striker is well known and documented.
When you decide to hire Marti Cifuentes, you leave that field of appointing a former great player, as the Spaniard has no experience from playing in top flight football. He played at a modest level in Spanish amateur football, moving to coaching at a very young age.
Report: Timbers set to hire Marti Cifuentes as head coach #MartiCifuentes #MLS
— FieldLevelMedia (@FieldLevelMedia) July 19, 2026
#RCTID https://t.co/07hFr6SAmv
Leicester made a shock move to appoint Marti Cifuentes before last season. He never really managed to handle the job in the best way, having a lot of issues in his team selections, not really able to get his ideas across to his players in full. A number of very negative results, especially at home, made it difficult to see him continue, finally getting the sack after a stumbling run of negative results.
Looking in the back mirror and listening to Marti Cifuentes in recent interviews made, he had no desire to leave himself and was confident he would have kept Leicester in the Championship. The fact that the club struggled heavily with a lot of injury issues might have been a more reasonable reason for relegation, rather than the choice of manager.
Wishing Marti Cifuentes all the best on his travels in football. MLS will be a valuable experience and again coaching on the highest level in a domestic league is a great positive, after being at QPR and Leicester, both struggling at the time in the second tier of English football.
Looking at his new club Portland Timbers, they have a unique history in American soccer. The club was founded in 2009, rising from the original teams that played from 1975 to 1981 in NASL. It’s great to see this history preserved while considering the fans.
Going back all those years you find some great names in football having represented this club. Two times league winnner, England international, Peter Withe, was here. So was Rob Rensenbrink, the Dutch forward playing in two World Cup finals.
At the moment there are a few exciting names at the club. The defender Finn Surmann is one, representing New Zealand in this years World Cup. Norwegian international Kristoffer Welde is another. The Brazilian winger Antony is also one to watch.
Other standout players for the Portland Timbers include forward Kevin Kelsy, who leads the team in goals, and midfielder David Da Costa, who paces the squad in both assists and overall offensive production. Other top contributors are midfielder Cole Bassett, along with veteran anchor Diego Chará.
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