On Monday, the 2nd of November 2020, Mohamad Dakka announced his resignation as manager of Bourj FC. The next day, the 3rd of November, the administrative board of Bourj FC decided to accept his resignation and appointed assistant coach Fouad Hijazi as interim manager for the matches to come.
Mohamad Dakka is no longer the manager of Bourj FC. Photo source: elmaestrosport.com
Mohamad Dakka has been appointed as manager of Bourj FC in April 2018, right after the end of the 2017-2018 season, when the team narrowly missed promotion to the Lebanese Premier League. In the next year, under the management of Mohamad Dakka, Bourj FC became champions of the Lebanese Second Divison and promoted to the Premier League in 2019, for the first time in 16 years. They also won the Challenge Cup in 2019 and had an excellent start in the Premier League, winning the first two matches, before the league was stopped in October 2019 and then cancelled.
However, the large break caused by COVID-19 pandemic was not beneficial for Bourj FC. The pre-season friendlies have already signalled that the team has some unsolved issues, and the start of the official season rendered clearly that Bourj FC is no longer at the same level as before and as expected. In five matches played so far, they have only won once, recorded two draws and two defeats. The objective is to classify in the top six, therefore to qualify for the play-off, but Bourj FC is currently ninth (out of 12) and the perspective is not so good, although there are still chances to get into the upper half of the classification.
The last two results were badly received by the majority of Bourj FC fans and by the club board: an unexpected 2-2 draw against last classified and that far pointless Salam Zgharta, and a 2-0 clear defeat to Nejmeh. Rumoured conflicts with some of the key footballers might have also played against Mohamad Dakka.
Fouad Hijazi has been so far the assistant coach of Mohamad Dakka, and is therefore well prepared to take over, at least for some time, the manager position. He knows all the issues within the team and hopefully he will be able to lead Bourj FC to a much desired top position in the Lebanese Premier League. His very first task will be to win the next match, on Sunday, the 8th of November, over AC Tripoli. It will be a difficult game, away to a team which is on high spirits after winning over Shabab El Bourj and climbing above Bourj FC in the classification. The match will be played at Tripoli Municipal Stadium on Sunday afternoon.
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