Francesco Guidolin

Francesco Guidolin (born 3 October 1955) is an Italian football manager and former player, most recently the manager of Premier League team Swansea City.

Playing Luca Toni as a lone striker among experienced players and those cast off from larger teams, he won the division, taking the Sicilians back to the top flight for the first time since 1973.

In the subsequent Serie A campaign, he guided Palermo to a sixth-place finish, earning their first ever UEFA Cup qualification.

However, he opted to leave the club at the end of the season.

Guidolin made his professional debut in 1975 with the Serie A club Hellas Verona, with whom he spent the majority of his career, save for loan moves to clubs Sambenedettese, Pistoiese and Bologna.

Internationally, Guidolin played for the Italy national under-21 team between 1976 and 1977.

After spending two seasons with Serie C2 club Venezia, he retired in 1986.

Guidolin's managerial debut came in 1988 as head coach of Serie C2 team Giorgione, the main club of his native city, Castelfranco Veneto.

Between 1989 and 1993, he then coached Treviso (Serie C2), Fano, Empoli and Ravenna, all in Serie C1.

Leading Ravenna to promotion to Serie B earned Guidolin a move to become head coach of Serie A club Atalanta on 1 July 1993, although he was sacked after just ten matches.

The next season, Guidolin joined Serie B side Vicenza and restored them following a period of decline.

After gaining promotion to Serie A at the end of the 1994–95 Serie B, his club finished mid-table the following Serie A season.

He has coached various Italian club sides in Serie A, winning the 1996–97 Coppa Italia with Vicenza, while also competing in European competitions with Vicenza, Udinese, Bologna and Palermo, as well as managing Ligue 1 club Monaco.

During the 1996–97 season, Vicenza led the league for a period, eventually achieving an eighth-place finish in Serie A, and won the 1997 Coppa Italia, defeating Napoli 3–1 on aggregate in the two-legged final.

It was the club's first domestic trophy.

As a result, the following season Guidolin had his first European campaign (and Vicenza's second ever), reaching the 1997–98 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup semi-final before losing to eventual winners Chelsea.

However, in the league season, Vicenza finished just one place above the relegation zone.

The club was also defeated by Juventus in the 1997 Supercoppa Italiana.

After managing Vicenza, Guidolin accepted the head coach position at Serie A side Udinese for the 1998–99 season.

Their previous third-place finish had qualified them the first round of the 1998–99 UEFA Cup, but they did not progress beyond this stage, losing to Bayer Leverkusen.

In the remaining league campaign, Guidolin was only able to guide them to a mid-table finish and was fired only days before the start of the following season.

In the middle of the 1999–2000 season, Guidolin joined Serie A side Bologna, a former club as a player.

Despite finishing ninth in the previous season, Bologna had qualified for the 1999–2000 UEFA Cup after winning a tie-breaker against Internazionale.

Guidolin took them to the third round of the UEFA Cup, where they were eliminated by Galatasaray.

The following league campaign ended with another ninth-place finish, followed by another small improvement to seventh place and entry into in a summer tournament, the 2002 UEFA Intertoto Cup, where they were defeated in the three-game final stage by Fulham.

The 2002–03 season began with good results but ended in a disappointing 11th-place finish and resulted in heavy criticism of Guidolin, which became more intense after Guidolin was heard insulting the city of Bologna during a match.

Guidolin returned to management with Palermo in January 2004, midway through the Serie B season.

For the start of the next season, Guidolin had agreed to join Genoa, who had gained promotion to Serie A from the 2004–05 Serie B.

However, after a match fixing scandal over their final league match was discovered, the Italian Football Federation instead placed Genoa last in Serie B, thereby relegating them to Serie C1.

As a result, Guidolin rescinded his contract.

In October 2005, Guidolin succeeded Didier Deschamps at Ligue 1 club Monaco.

He signed a two-year contract in his first managerial post outside Italy.

On 30 May 2006, in a surprise move, Guidolin was re-hired by his former club Palermo.

In his absence, they had reached the round of 16 in their inaugural UEFA Cup run, and had also qualified for the 2006–07 UEFA Cup despite finishing eighth in the league, due to Italian match fixing scandals costing other clubs their places.

Guidolin's Serie A campaign started well, but after losing star player Amauri to injury in December, the team went over two months without a win.

In the UEFA Cup, they progressed to the group stage but failed to qualify for the knockout stages, ending their campaign in December.

The season was also disrupted when the club was one of the two teams involved in the Sicilian derby of 2 February 2007 which led to riots and a police fatality, resulting in various safety restrictions being imposed on the league.

Having dropped out of the UEFA Champions League qualification places, Guidolin was sacked on 23 April following a 4–3 home defeat to relegation-threatened Parma.

The club finished 10th in his only season.

In the Serie A season, they finished in 11th place.