Former Carlisle United star Michael Bridges is keen on succeeding Keith Curle as manager at Brunton Park, it is understood.

The 39-year-old is interested in returning to the Blues as boss.

It is believed Bridges will contact United about the position after it was yesterday confirmed Curle will be leaving the club this summer.

Bridges, who had two spells with Carlisle between 2005 and 2009, is currently based in Australia where he is a TV pundit, after finishing his playing career in the country.

The ex-Premier League striker has made little secret, though, of his wish to break into management, having taken his coaching badges Down Under.

Speaking to the News & Star in December 2015, former Sunderland and Leeds star Bridges also revealed his ambition to manage United one day.

"I’ve had a lot of clubs but the four places I’d want to go back to would be Carlisle, Leeds, Sunderland, Newcastle," he said.

“It’s unlikely I’m going to get the Newcastle or Sunderland job, but it’s very realistic in the future to say I’ve managed Carlisle. You’ve got to have aspirations.”

Bridges, a talisman in United's Legaue Two title-winning side in 2005/6, said he had learned from top managers he had worked under, like Sir Bobby Robson at Newcastle and Paul Simpson at Carlisle.

Asked what sort of boss he would be, he said: “Fair but hard. I’d always have the door open. It’s also about giving players the belief to express themselves. David O’Leary and Peter Reid brought it out of me – ‘once you get over the halfway line, do whatever the hell you want. Entertain those people’.

“Other managers are less like that. [Gary] Johnson at Bristol City was one. It was so structured and religious – don’t do this or that. It was refreshing to come up here with Simmo and Dennis Booth [in 2005]. They said they already had structure, so I had that free role to go and run the show. You need players like that. If you’re telling them where to be every second, you lose faith and they become robots.”

Bridges does not yet feature in the early betting for the position, which sees former United boss Neil McDonald the evens favourite.

Ex-United star Matt Jansen, manager of National League North side Chorley, is 6/1 along with former Scunthorpe boss Graham Alexander.

Former Huddersfield and Bury boss Lee Clark is 8/1, Blues legend and current Annan manager Peter Murphy 10/1, and at 12/1 are United academy boss Darren Edmondson and veteran defender Clint Hill - who has been strongly linked with a move to Fleetwood to work under Joey Barton.

Last night former midfielder and News & Star columnist Chris Lumsdon made an unlikely surge to be 6/4 favourite with BetVictor but his name no longer features in the market.