What if the first fired coach of the Betclic ÉLITE season was the… French champion coach?! Weakened by a failed final week, where AS Monaco lost twice at home (90-98 against Red Star Belgrade and 74-86 against Le Mans), Sasa Obradovic would have been thanked during the day indicates the Serbian press, where Mondo was the first media to reveal the information. Contacted, the Principality club did not respond to our requests.
After the setback against Le Mans on Sunday afternoon, the Belgrader left Gaston-Médecin to the whistles of part of the Monegasque public, where some even called for his resignation. “For the first time here, the fans booed me”he said at a press conference, in comments reported by Nice Matin. “I take it personally and it’s very difficult to take. […] I don't sleep so that we can produce a good game, not to get booed. I am ready to do anything for this team but the players have to give everything too. »
Sergio Scariolo, the most attractive free coach?
Having passed through AS Monaco for the first time between February 2019 and June 2020, where he won nothing, Sasa Obradovic returned to the helm of the Roca Team in December 2021, after the dismissal of Zvezdan Mitrovic. He allowed the Roca Team to experience its finest era in terms of accounting results, winning its first two French championship trophies, its first Coupe de France and reaching the Final Four of the EuroLeague in 2023. However, the champion du monde 1998 was never really unanimous, the fault of sometimes faulty play or rotations that were often difficult to understand. But he always knew how to be saved by strong relationships: with star Mike James, who multiplied the pleas for him, with GM Oleksiy Yefimov, who has known him since his first position in kyiv, and even with owner Aleksej Fedorychev. In a recent interview with the Serbian press, Obradovic claimed to have received assurances from his president that he would remain in office for a long time. A promise which would therefore not have survived a chaotic start to the season, where, beyond the results (6v-4d in EuroLeague, 6v-3d in Betclic ELITE), AS Monaco never really appealed.
If the information is confirmed, Monegasque decision-makers will find themselves faced with a crucial decision: who to replace Sasa Obradovic? Already quite sparse, the coaching market lost one of its most eminent representatives at the end of last week: Dimitris Itoudis, just hired by Hapoel Tel-Aviv. Long appreciated by the Roca Team, multi-medalist with Spain, Sergio Scariolo serves as an obvious candidate.
