One-time Crystal Palace manager target Lucian Favre could bring an end to his coaching career after being overlooked by Celtic and Premier League strugglers Everton in the last two years.
That is according to FootMercato; the softly-spoken Swiss potentially about to trade in his tactics board for a free bus pass at the age of 65.
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One of the modern era’s more underrated tacticians, Lucian Favre famously took Borussia Monchengladbach from a Bundesliga relegation battle into the Champions League, guided a Mario Balotelli-inspired Nice into Ligue 1’s top three, and Borussia Dortmund to German Cup glory.
An enviable CV still was not enough to convince UK-based clubs to take a punt on the vastly-experienced Favre.
Celtic and Everton overlooked Lucian Favre
According to the Daily Mail, the one-time Hertha Berlin coach was ‘interested’ in taking over at Celtic. That was shortly before the Hoops handed the reigns to Ange Postecoglou instead.
Few would argue that was the wrong call; Postecoglou celebrating a second successive Scottish Premiership title earlier in the month.
Whether or not Everton will regret overlooking a man who has a track record of dragging struggling clubs away from the relegation zone, meanwhile, depends on whether Sean Dyche can keep Toffees’ heads above water during a tense final two games against Wolves and AFC Bournemouth.
Everton are currently outside of the bottom three by just one point.
Favre, who FootMercato believe is now considering bowing out of the game altogether, also claims to have rejected the Crystal Palace post back in 2021. The Eagles would hire Patrick Vieira instead. But, after an excellent first season, Palace parachuted veteran firefighter Roy Hodgson back in to prevent a flicker of flame from becoming an all-out blaze.
“Yes, that’s right,” Favre said; turning down the Palace job despite the obvious admiration of Eagles chairman Steve Parish.
“The timing wasn’t right.”
‘I was on Everton’s shortlist’
Crystal Palace have been a team revived since Hodgson’s return. Reports suggesting that the 75-year-old could be rewarded with a more long-term deal until the end of next season, however, have fans once again questioning the direction of the Parish regime.
Favre, interestingly, was on Everton’s radar back in 2016 too.
“I know that I was on Everton’s shortlist,” Favre admitted at the time, via The Mirror. “But I didn’t want to wait any more.”
The Toffees opted for Ronald Koeman; a disastrous decision which would set the tone for the entire Farhad Moshiri era.
