It was a bit of a shock when he arrived at Southampton in January 2013. They'd won back to back promotions in the previous two years under Nigel Adkins and the decision to sack him and replace him with the little known Argentinean didn't go down too well with Saints fans at the time.
Opinions have certainly changed since in his 16 months at St. Mary's with Southampton finishing last season in eighth place in the league. Yet a move away always looked likely after the departure of executive chairman Nicola Cortese in January of this year.
That move is to Spurs who have had a difficult year with two managerial changes. They sacked André Villas-Boas in December, replacing him internally with Tim Sherwood but it became clear very soon that Sherwood, despite signing a deal to the end of the 2014/15 season was destined to depart this summer.
They were strongly linked with van Gaal, before United nipped in to take him and fellow Dutchman Frank de Boer, but it is Pochettino they eventually decided on and yesterday he signed a five year deal with the North London club as their Head Coach.
Meanwhile, back at Southampton, former FC Basel manager Murat Yakin is one of the early favourites in the betting along with Ronald Koeman, former Swansea boss Michael Laudrup and current Sunderland head coach Gus Poyet.
Our former manager Eddie Howe, an ex-Portsmouth player, is currently 14/1 with Sky Bet whilst Sean Dyche has gone out to 40/1.
There were also two Football League managerial appointments yesterday. In the morning Tranmere confirmed that Rob Edwards would be their new manager and in the evening former Millwall striker Bob Peeters was named as the latest manager at Belgian owned Charlton.