'I been in the right place but it must have been the wrong time. I'd have said the right thing but I must have used the wrong line. I been on the right trip but I must have used the wrong car. My head was in a bad place and I'm wondering what it's good for...' - Right Place, Wrong Time, by Dr John
Mauricio Pochettino has many attributes but timing is not one of them. There is a club job out there that is perfect for him, but not now.
He should be the next manager of Manchester City, after Pep Guardiola. Except Guardiola insists he is staying, so it probably won't happen.
Yet think about it. Everyone links Pochettino with Manchester United but that is a project requiring many years to complete. Succeeding Guardiola is a serious challenge, but far from impossible for a coach with Pochettino's talents. It plays to his strengths, too.
Rebuilding an ageing squad, finally giving Phil Foden the run he deserves. Pochettino might also reunite with Harry Kane at a club financially empowered to make such a deal happen.
He would be in a familiar league with no acclimatisation required, he plays good football, he has the charisma to promote a growing brand and would surely respond positively to City's powers of recruitment having lived so long within his means at Tottenham. It would be perfect for him, and them. Next year. That's when it would have fitted.
Had Pochettino's departure happened 12 months from now, with Guardiola in the final year of his contract, it would have been a heaven-made match. Instead, how can City make this happen in a way that does not unsettle the current manager or frustrate the next one?
In an ideal world they would already be in negotiation.
Pochettino would be in receipt of a pre-contract that secures his services from no later than July 2021 when Guardiola departs.
The transition would be smooth and no secret. It would curtail disruptive speculation, end uncertainty. The fans, the players, would know they were getting a first-class replacement, one who will have been studying performance levels and areas for potential improvement.
There could be no slacking off. And from Pochettino's perspective he could take time out to recharge from the intensity of his experiences at Tottenham, just as Guardiola did after Barcelona, and before Bayern Munich.
Spend some time in New York, go and watch the US Masters, take in the tennis, a sandy beach somewhere, see football for fun again, whatever it takes to come back refreshed. In 20 months' time. That's the problem.
If Guardiola is true to his word and takes charge next season, the earliest City could gainfully employ Pochettino would be prior to the 2021-22 season; and that will seem an age away to any young manager.
Next summer would be different. Pochettino must surely acknowledge how much the Tottenham job has taken out of him. To take a break for the remainder of this season makes sense. But the whole year after that? It is hard to see the appeal, no matter how generous City's retainer.
And Pochettino should appeal to them, no doubt of that. Not least because it would be suspected that he might come as a package with Europe's finest striker.
Jose Mourinho's impact on Tottenham cannot yet be guaranteed so, short term at least, rival clubs suspect Pochettino's departure might unsettle Kane.
Whether suitors can make the books legal and spend £200million on one player is another matter but City have the wherewithal certainly.
They have resisted the temptation to trump Manchester United for talent in the past, but might make an exception for this one. It would be some statement of intent for the new manager, too.
So everything about Pochettino and City makes sense — apart from the timescale.
There was similar inadvertent mischief at work when he was courted by Real Madrid. Privately, the Spanish club expressed astonishment that a coach who was plainly on their radar in 2018 should sign a new five-year contract which would cost in the region of £40m to break.
Madrid have paid compensation for managers before but never on that scale – and not for a coach yet to win a cup.
It would have appeared an extraordinary gamble, even by their standards. They wondered why Pochettino didn't just wait on developments – although he is a free man now, if Zinedine Zidane's second spell disappoints.
Bayern Munich are also in flux and maybe Manchester United too if Ole Gunnar Solskjaer cannot effect a lasting improvement this season so it is not as if Pochettino will be without options.
Yet City would have been the best fit had circumstances at Tottenham not dictated otherwise. Maybe Daniel Levy knew that, too. Pochettino was in the right place, but at the wrong time. Someone should write a song about it.