Dubai: Former Japan and AC Milan coach Alberto Zaccheroni is on the verge of becoming the next UAE boss after arriving in Dubai for talks on Saturday.

The 64-year-old Italian, who also managed Lazio, Inter and Juventus, was on a three-man shortlist to replace Edgardo Bauza along with Peru coach Ricardo Gareca and Honduras boss Jorge Luis Pinto.

Both Gareca and Pinto have been retained by Peru and Honduras after making the play-offs for 2018 World Cup qualification, and it appears the UAE are not prepared to wait on the results of those two fixtures, which will only be known by November 15. Honduras play Australia and Peru face New Zealand.

Bauza left the UAE to coach the Saudi Arabia national team last month after just three competitive games in charge of the Whites. The former Argentina coach joined the UAE in May, he couldn’t turn their World Cup qualifying bid around in time and duly left to replace Bert van Marwijk, who had already qualified Saudi for the World Cup but didn’t want to renegotiate a new contract.

Both the UAE and Saudi football federations reportedly came to an agreement of cooperation over the switched services of Bauza and compensation was waived.

Zaccheroni won the Scudetto with AC Milan in 1999, also picking up Serie A coach of the year for his efforts. He then went onto lift the Asian Cup with Japan in 2011.

The Italian also led Japan to the 2014 World Cup finals where they were knocked-out in the group stage with defeats to the Ivory Coast 2-1 and Colombia 4-1 either side of a goalless draw with Greece.

He resigned after that campaign and has since only lasted five months with Chinese Super League outfit Beijing Guoan at the beginning of last year.

His possible appointment would be an unnecessarily hurried development from the UAE Football Association (UAE FA) who have time to pick a successor.

After failing to reach the 2018 World Cup and with this winter’s Gulf Cup in Qatar in doubt due to diplomatic relations, the UAE’s next major tournament isn’t until their hosting of the Asian Cup in 2019.

With that in mind, the UAE could have afforded to wait on the results of Peru and Honduras’ play-off results next month to see if either Gareca or Pinto became free agents following possible defeat.

The UAE FA’s remit was to select a coach with a proven track-record of taking smaller teams the distance in World Cups.

Gareca has arguably done that by reaching the play-offs with Peru, while Pinto famously topped a World Cup group with Costa Rica in 2014 beating Uruguay 3-1, Italy 1-0 and drawing a blank with England. They went on to beat Greece 5-3 on penalties in the last 16 before a 4-3 defeat to Holland on penalties in the quarter-final. His exploits with Honduras now show he could be set to pull off a similar upset next summer.

Zaccheroni’s World Cup form with Japan is decidedly average, but the UAE will be heartened by his Asian Cup winning pedigree.