Crystal Palace parted company with Sage on Thursday following a poor start to the 2026–27 Premier League season, leaving the club bottom of the table with only seven points from 10 matches.
The biggest challenge for Palace’s next manager will undoubtedly be to shore up the league’s worst defence and pull the club out of the relegation zone.
After losing key players such as Marc Guehi to Manchester City and Maxence Lacroix to Chelsea, Sage struggled badly to repair a defence that suffered heavy defeats, including a 5-0 loss to Brighton, while conceding 24 goals in 10 Premier League matches - the worst record in the division - with a -14 goal difference.
Reports suggest that negotiations are already underway between the London club and Frank, who has been without a job since February this year, when he was dismissed by Tottenham Hotspur.
A potential managerial role for Frank at Selhurst Park seems to make sense given his pragmatic, defensively minded tactical approach to the game, which made him 'Persona non grata' amongst football romantics at Spurs but could be just what the doctor ordered at Palace around a squad built to play reactive, counter-attacking football.
Throughout his lengthy spell at Brentford (2017–2025), Frank consistently guided the club to steady top-flight finishes between ninth and 16th, transforming an underdog team into an efficient, statistically reliable Premier League side.
Frank especially excels at coaching compact, disciplined defensive blocks to absorb pressure which will certainly be a top priority for Palace.
In all competitions, Palace’s 29.6 expected goals against (xGA) is the highest figure recorded by any club in Europe’s top five leagues. In comparison, Frank’s Brentford conceded only 220 goals in their first four Premier League seasons, one fewer than Tottenham’s 221 over the same period, and averaged 1.47 goals conceded per match across 152 top-flight games.
Sage recorded just 0.70 points per Premier League match (seven points in 10 games), leaving Palace rooted at the bottom.
Even when his challenging eight-month tenure at Tottenham is included - where he averaged 1.12 points per game in the league - Frank’s career Premier League average is 1.29 points per game. At Brentford, his 1.32 points-per-game average would translate to approximately 50 points across a 38-game season, which should comfortably be above the relegation zone.
Frank was handicapped by working with one of the Premier League’s smaller budgets at Brentford, but his teams still managed to score 228 goals in 152 Premier League matches - 1.50 goals per game - which surpassed Manchester United’s 214 goals over the same period.
And his ability to maximise attacking efficiency through structured transitions and set pieces could potentially be exactly the right medicine for the decline across Palace’s forward line this season.
Although Frank’s time at Tottenham was difficult (W13, D11, L14), transforming a struggling lower or mid-table team with a clear structure seems far better suited to his pragmatic approach than managing a global “Big Six” club under enormous existential pressure.
Having already experienced London’s football landscape and the demands of a Premier League relegation battle, Frank has no commitments that would prevent him from taking charge of Palace during the international break.
Furthermore, should Palace seek to strengthen their squad during the winter window, Frank’s obvious connections with former club Tottenham could help him pursue Premier League-ready players such as Richarlison or Conor Gallagher, who have slipped down the pecking order at N17, to ignite a second-half survival push for the Eagles.
Svend Bertil Frandsen has been Senior News Editor for Flashscore News in Denmark since September 2022. He previously worked for UEFA and FIFA and is a former tennis pro. He specialises in news around football, tennis, badminton and handball. You can also follow him on LinkedIn.
