Pochettino announces he is ‘back home’ in cryptic Instagram post just before Tottenham sack Conte

MAURICIO POCHETTINO announced he was "back home" just before Tottenham sacked Antonio Conte.

The former Spurs boss, 51, is currently out of work having left Paris Saint-Germain last summer.

And he has been heavily linked with a return to North London even before Conte was officially dismissed.

So his cryptic post for his 649,000 followers had plenty of Tottenham fans excited about him taking over again.

Poch took to his story with a selfie with his wife Karina captioned "Back Home, Arigato [thank you] Japan".

The photo was taken from the seats of their aeroplane as they flew back to their London pad following a romantic getaway to Japan.

Some Tottenham fans tried to convince Pochettino to take over as their manager again, even sliding into the Argentine's DMs.

Others took to Twitter getting excited about the prospect of his comeback.

One said: "Just flying home from Japan. Should be back in time for training.";

Another wrote: "Welcome home Pochettino. You were missed dearly."

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And a third wannabe detective added: "Do we know if Pochettino was always due to fly back home yesterday? It looked from his Insta posts that he'd only just arrived in Tokyo."

Pochettino is one of Spurs' most successful and popular managers in recent history - despite failing to win a trophy with the club.

He averaged 1.89 points per game - the most for any Tottenham boss in Premier League history with a minimum of 38 Premier League games in charge.

The ex-Southampton chief capped off his five-year stint at White Hart Lane by leading Spurs to the 2019 Champions League final, where they lost to Liverpool.

Conte, 53, finally departed Spurs late on Sunday night with a blunt statement.

Eight days on from his astonishing attack on his "selfish" flops and the club's 20 years of underachievement, the confirmation arrived.

He is allegedly in line to receive a £15million payout in compensation while his right-hand man Cristian Stellini has taken caretaker charge until the end of the season.

Pochettino and Julian Nagelsmann are the favourites to be appointed as Conte's successor in the summer.

Sacked Bayern Munich boss Nagelsmann is said to be open to talks with the North London club and has an affinity for the club - even once owning a Spurs shirt.

But as revealed by SunSport, Poch is also keen and still has a good relationship with Daniel Levy.