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Former Fulham manager
Jean Tigana |
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Former Fulham manager and French international midfielder Jean Tigana is expected to land in Riyadh on Thursday evening to put pen to paper on a year-and-a-half contract with local giants Al Hilal.
The Saudi FA decided to end the previous Romanian coach Cosmin Olaroiu’s contract over an incident of offending a royal figure after winning the cup final.
Olariou had a bust up with security personnel for not letting him go up to the rostrum before the proceedings had begun, and he refused to accept his medal afterwards, throwing to the ground his t-shirt with Crown Prince Sultan’s image print on it. Prince Sultan was attending the final of the cup named after himself, and was due to hand the cup and medals to the winners.
Tigana is 53 years old now, and was born in Bamako, Mali, then reallocated to France at an early age. He started his professional career as a player at Toulon (Sporting Toloun Var), and moved on to play for Lyon, Bordeaux and Marseille before he announced his retirement in 1991.
His managing career started in 1993 with Lyon, and in 1995 he was at the helm of Monaco. He then moved on to EPL and assumed responsibility at the hot seat at the Craven Cottage between 2000-2003. After leaving his post at Fulham, he took a short leave before he was back with Besiktas in 2005. In 2007 he took another time out, but he seems to be back now with Al Hilal for the rest of the season.
Al Hilal boast a quality squad including Swedish international midfielder Christian Wilhelmsson, veteran Romanian midfielder Mirel Radoi and Seol Ki-Hyoen who is on loan from English side Fulham. The biggest local star is the lethal striker and former Asian player of the year Yasser Al Qahtani.