Ranked! The 20 managers who have taken charge of the most games

20. Bill Struth (1179 games)

A one-club man, Struth was appointed as Rangers' second ever boss in 1920. He'd previously served as the Glasgow outfit's assistant manager for six seasons, but stepping into the hot seat didn't prove a problem: Struth went on to win an incredible 18 league titles and 10 Scottish Cups during his 34 years at Ibrox. A portrait of the Leith-born gaffer hangs in Rangers' trophy room to this day.

19. Ignacio Trelles (1189 games)

A veteran of Mexican football who turned 101 in summer 2017, Trelles enjoyed no fewer than five separate spells in charge of the national team. Two of those stints encompassed the 1962 and 1966 World Cups, but his crowning achievement was at club level, where he led Cruz Azul to back-to-back league titles in 1979 and 1980.

Trelles also coached Zacatepec, C.D. Marte, Club America, Toluca, Atlante, UDG and Puebla during a career which spanned four decades.

18. Denis Smith (1195 games)

Smith ended his playing career at York City and was installed as the Minstermen's manager in 1982. The Fourth Division title followed two years later, while York were seconds away from administering an FA Cup giant killing against Liverpool in the 1985/86 campaign.

The former defender then took Sunderland from the third to the first division, then kept Bristol City in the second, and despite an underwhelming spell at West Brom he later guided Oxford and Wrexham to promotion, too.

17. Jupp Heynckes (1224 games)

Heynckes brought the curtain down on his managerial career in perfect fashion, winning the 2012/13 Champions League to secure a historic treble for Bayern Munich. The ex-Germany international also won Europe's biggest trophy with Real Madrid, and also led Borussia Monchengladbach, Schalke, Tenerife, Benfica and Athletic Bilbao among other clubs.

16. Otto Rehhagel (1225 games)

Rehhagel's guidance of Greece to glory at the European Championship in 2004 was perhaps all the more remarkable as it was his only professional position outside his German homeland. A teak-tough defender as a player, he turned the Greeks into an almost impenetrable opponent – but he wasn't always so tight at the back: early in his management career, his Borussia Dortmund side were annihilated 12-0 by Borussia Monchengladbach..

After bouncing around a few German clubs he settled at Werder Bremen between 1981 and 1995, leading them to two Bundesliga triumphs and the 1992 Cup Winners' Cup. He then switched to hated rivals Bayern Munich - unwisely, as he never fitted in and was sacked four days before the first leg of the UEFA Cup Final. He later won another Bundesliga title with Kaiserslautern before his finest hour with Greece.

15. Carlo Mazzone (1278 games)

Italian chairmen aren't exactly famed for their patience, so Mazzone deserves extra credit for securing a place on this list. Granted, the Rome-born boss required 12 clubs to rack up his 1278 games, but success with the likes of Cagliari, Bologna and Brescia ensured he was always a man in demand.

Francesco Totti, Roberto Ayala, Roberto Baggio, Luca Toni and Pep Guardiola are some of the famous names to have been coached by Mazzone, who is also credited with converting Brescia's erstwhile No.10 Andrea Pirlo into a deep-lying playmaker.

14. Brian Clough (1453 games)

One of the greatest managers British football has ever produced, Clough was also one of the longest-serving. Derby were richly rewarded for taking a punt on a coach whose experience at that stage amounted to 85 matches in charge of Hartlepool, with the Rams going on to win the First Division title in 1972.

Thirty-four games at Brighton was followed by an infamous 44-day stint as Leeds chief, before Clough proved Derby wasn't a one-off by claiming another league championship and two European Cups within the space of three seasons at Nottingham Forest, with whom he remained until 1993.

13. George Ramsay (1327 games)

Ramsay's name popped up in the press both before and after the 2017 FA Cup final, when Arsenal's Arsene Wenger overtook the former Aston Villa boss as the manager with the most triumphs in the competition.

Glasgow-born Ramsay won the tournament six times between 1884 and 1926, while his record of six top-flight English titles - all at Villa, his only club - is bettered only by Sir Alex Ferguson.

12. Neil Warnock (1386 games)

Warnock is proving there's life in the old dog yet this season: at the time of writing, his Cardiff side lead the way in the Championship.

The Yorkshireman is a veteran of the second tier, having managed boyhood club Sheffield United, Notts County, Crystal Palace, Leeds, Queens Park Rangers, Rotherham and current club Cardiff at that level, but he also has experience lower down the ladder and has bossed three clubs in the Premier League.

11. Giovanni Trapattoni (1382 games)

Irish football fans may have bad memories of il Trap, yet in his day the Italian was one of the best managers around. Having represented Milan as a player, he was installed at the helm of the Rossoneri in 1975; it was with Juventus, though, that Trapattoni made his name as a coach, winning six Serie A crowns, two UEFA Cups and the European Cup in Turin.

Further medals were obtained at Inter (one league title, one UEFA Cup), Bayern Munich (one Bundesliga, one DFB-Pokal), Benfica (one Primeira Liga) and Red Bull Salzburg (one Austian Bundesliga), before the septuagenarian rounded off his career with the Republic of Ireland.

10. Graham Taylor (1385 games)

England's failure to reach the knockout stage of Euro 92 and qualify for the 1994 World Cup on Taylor's watch made his tenure as Three Lions boss a poor one, but the former full-back enjoyed great success at club level.

He came to prominence at Lincoln, managing them at 28 and gaining promotion at 31, but his work at Watford was particularly brilliant: Taylor led the Hornets from the Fourth Division to the First in just five years, then finished second in the top flight and reached the FA Cup final. He repeated the runners-up feat with Aston Villa in 1990, and later had second spells with both clubs before retiring in 2003.

9. Harry Redknapp (1395 games)

Redknapp's recent sacking by Birmingham has probably ushered the 70-year-old into retirement, although there's still a chance he could climb further up this list in the future.

Redknapp took the reins at Bournemouth after hanging up his boots in 1982, guiding the south coast side into the Second Division and recording a famous upset against Manchester United in the FA Cup. He then moved on to West Ham in the early 1990s and led Portsmouth to FA Cup glory in 2008, before taking Tottenham into the Champions League and, bizarrely, bossing Jordan for two matches in 2016.

8. Bobby Robson (1446 games)

Having learned of his sacking by Fulham from a newspaper placard, Robson was installed at unfashionable Ipswich in the late 1960s. It kick-started a period of unexpected success for the Suffolk side, who won the FA Cup in 1978 and UEFA Cup in 1981.

Those achievements were enough for Robson to become England's next manager; he took his country to the quarter-finals at  the 1986 World Cup and the last four in 1990, when a penalty shoot-out defeat by Germany prevented the Three Lions from reaching the final.

Robson later managed PSV, Sporting CP (where he took a young Jose Mourinho under his wing), Porto and Barcelona, before rounding things off with boyhood club Newcastle between 1999 and 2003.

7. Jim Smith (1475 games)

Smith made his first steps in the coaching world at the age of just 28, becoming Boston's player-manager in 1969. He continued in the same role at Colchester, before focusing solely on management at Blackburn, Birmingham and Oxford.

It was with the latter that he enjoyed some of his best moments, leading the U's to the top flight for the first time in their history after back-to-back promotions. He later took QPR to the League Cup final, Portsmouth to the FA Cup semi-finals and Derby to the Premier League.

6. Dario Gradi (1560 games)

Strongly associated with a single side without being a one-club man, Gradi spent a year at Sutton, three at Wimbledon and a few months at Crystal Palace before joining Crewe in 1983.

The Milan-born boss spent an unbroken 24 years in charge of the Railwaymen, developing a reputation for talent spotting and improving young players along the way. He moved upstairs in 2007 but later returned for two shorter spells, finally calling it a day in 2011.

5. Willie Maley (1611 games)

Maley only made 75 league appearances for Celtic during his playing days, but he enjoyed considerably more stickability once he swapped the pitch for the touchline in 1897. The two-time Scotland international managed the Glasgow giants for a remarkable 43 years and 1611 games, before finally calling it a day in 1940.

Born in County Down, Maley moved to Scotland as an infant and joined the club as a teenager. He became their first secretary-manager at the age of 29 and won 30 major honours - 16 league titles (including six in a row from 1905 to 1910) and 14 Scottish Cups.

4. Alec Stock (1618 games)

Stock's managerial career began shortly after the Second World War, when he was chosen to be Yeovil's new boss. His reputation was boosted by a run to the fifth round of the FA Cup in 1949; a few months later Stock was unveiled as the manager of Leyton Orient, where he spent a decade, before an unexpected spell at AS Roma. Not bad for the gentlemanly chap said to be the main influence on The Fast Show character Ron Manager.

His decision to return to England with QPR was a smart one: Stock won the League Cup in west London and also took Rangers into the top tier for the first time. After being brutally edged out by the chairman while recuperating from chronic asthma, he moved on to Luton and Fulham, reaching the FA Cup final with the latter, and concluded his career at Bournemouth in 1980.

3. Graham Turner (1647 games)

Turner spent the majority of his time as a manager within a 55-mile radius, enjoying two spells at both Shrewsbury and Hereford. He twice led the former to the semi-finals of the FA Cup during his first stint between 1978 and 1984, before bookending his career at Gay Meadow with a four-year stretch from 2010.

In between, Turner took Hereford from the Conference to League One, while also winning two promotions with Wolves and spending 105 matches as Aston Villa boss.

2. Arsene Wenger (1653 games)

Wenger climbed into second spot earlier this season, overtaking Graham Turner when Arsenal faced Koln in the Europa League in September. The vast majority of the Frenchman's 1653 managerial matches have come at Arsenal (1186), where he's won three Premier League titles and seven FA Cups during his 21 years at the helm.

Before arriving in England as a relative unknown in 1996, Wenger won Ligue 1 with Monaco and the Emperor's Cup at Nagoya Grampus Eight, while he also spent 114 games in charge of Nancy in the 1980s.

1. Alex Ferguson (2155 games)

Arguably the world's greatest ever manager, Ferguson's sheer longevity is as impressive as his medal collection. The Scot took his first steps down the coaching path at 32, managing East Stirlingshire for a few months before St Mirren came calling.

Success in Paisley led to his appointment at Aberdeen, who Ferguson inspired to three league titles and the Cup Winners' Cup. That was enough to persuade Manchester United to make their move. Some fans famously called for the manager's head after a trophy-less start, but by the end of his time at Old Trafford Ferguson had won 13 Premier League titles, two Champions Leagues, five FA Cups and four League Cups, as well as becoming the first manager to break the 2000-game barrier.