ArmeniaNow.com
25th Jan 2008
By Suren Musayelyan
Jan Poulsen was introduced as Armenia’s new head coach on Thursday as the Football Federation had signed a two-year contract with the 62-year-old specialist from Denmark.
No financial details of the contract were disclosed.
The zenith of Poulsen’s coaching career was in 1992 when he was assistant coach of Denmark – the national side that won the European championship that year.
Poulsen also coached Denmark’s U-21 team in the 90s before continuing his work first as coach of Singapore and then as coach of Jordan’s youth team.
The Armenian Federation says negotiations had been conducted with several specialists and the job was offered to Poulsen based on his professional skills and experience.
Poulsen is the sixth foreign coach of Armenia since 2002. He replaces Scottish tactician Ian Porterfield, who died of cancer last September.
The Malta tournament in early February will be Poulsen’s first task in his new capacity.
Meanwhile, FC Banants ended ingloriously their participation in the CIS/Baltic States Cup in St. Petersburg, Russia, failing to advance to quarterfinals from the group stage.
Drawing with BATE (Belarus) 1-1, Armenia’s 2007 runner-up lost to current Cup holders Pakhtakor (Uzbekistan) 0-3 and Dynamo Kiev (Ukraine) 0-1. With only one point in three games, Banants finished bottom in Group D.
The best result shown by an Armenian team in the 15-year history of the annual tournament was FC Pyunik’s reaching the semifinal against Baku’s Neftchi in 2006. Pyunik players failed to show up for the match for security reasons and were banned from participating in future CIS Cup tournaments (forcing replacements by runner-ups), while the Azerbaijani champion went to win the title that year.
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