Kiss Him Goodbye: Esperance Loses Zouaoui, Calls on Cabral… Again

Reports from Tunis indicate that Youssef Zouaoui has resigned from his post at Esperance as of this afternoon. Citing unrealistic fan expectations that led to rising pressure on the players and staff, the coach decided to take his leave from the Red and Gold outfit. Hamdi Meddeb, the team president, has turned to none other than Brazilian Carlos Cabral, a man who he fired at the beginning of the season after a series of results that were deemed unacceptable.

The divorce between Zouaoui and Taraji marks another letdown for Esperance supporters who have seen their team struggle mightily after getting used to dominating Tunisia and Africa at large for so long. Given their troubles, you would expect their recent cup derby victory over Club Africain to have satisfied some of them and given Zouaoui more time to work in peace.

The manner of the victory, a beautifully taken Eneramo strike in the dying second of injury time was especially sweet and the celebrations would have had you believing things weren’t going so bad. However, consecutive league losses to CA and Bizerte proved otherwise. Plus that embarrassingly heavy away loss to a second divsion Moroccan side, Rachad Bernoussi, wasn’t exactly a good omen for the rest of the season.

Opinions about Zouaoui vary widely depending on who you talk to but I was under the impression that things were moving in the right direction. The team has boatloads of money and an almost unrivaled reputation on the continent. Most importantly, there is a great deal of talent in the squad with such notable players as the aforementioned Eneramo, set piece master Kamel Zaiem, left foot Moroccan cannon Hicham Aboucherouane, and Mr. Reliable Khaled Badra. Couple that with promising young talent (Darraji, Ayari, Derbali) and new mercato signings (Bienvenue and Mzali) and you have the makings of a pretty decent team.

In addition, there’s rumors U17 starlet Youssef Msakni is waiting out his amateur contract with Stade Tunisien in Dubai and is set to return in Taraji colors next year. So it’s not all doom and gloom really. One fair criticism of Zouaoui is that he never settled on a starting eleven and was always tinkering with the lineup, hurting continuity. Besides that I didn’t see much wrong…

Nevertheless, the choice of Cabral strikes me as somewhat odd given that the consensus when I was in Tunis this past summer was that he wasn’t the right guy for the job. Even so, it has to be said that he never benefited from an injury free squad. We’ll see if he can continue the rebuilding process for the sleeping giant of Tunisian football. The name Esperance remains as recognizable and prestigious as ever but will their results reflect this? Patience is in short supply among the die hard mkach5as, we’ll see what they think of this…

In Other News

Speaking of Esperance, Ahmed Hammi is on the verge of signing with FC Sion of Switzerland. Funny it should happen just as Zouaoui is leaving. Hammi hasn’t enjoyed playing out of position since joining Taraji so this move to Europe comes just in time. We wish him all the best of course!