CSKA Sofia coach resigns

CSKA Sofia coach Lyuboslav Penev announced his resignation on Friday, citing interference from the club’s management after his decision to suspend several players was overturned.

“I don’t want to leave CSKA through the back door and I’m resigning from the club,” Penev wrote in a letter to the club’s management published by BTA news agency.

Penev, who only took over as CSKA’s coach in March, explained his departure by saying he disagreed with the decisions of the club’s owners — two Bulgarian businessmen — and its chief executive.

“I categorically reject your direct interference in my work,” he wrote in his letter, citing in particular “the return to the team of suspended players.”

CSKA announced on Tuesday that Penev had suspended nine players for disciplinary offences, following reports that they had been spotted drinking in night clubs after midnight in contravention of team disciplinary rules.

Penev, a former Bulgarian international and CSKA striker, blamed his players’ late-night partying for two consecutive Bulgarian league defeats.

But four players — defender and Bulgarian international Pavel Vidanov, midfielder Todor Timonov, as well as Brazilian Marquinhos, Portugal’s David Silva — were later pardoned by CSKA’s management after they apologised for their offences.

The suspension of the other five — Bulgarian internationals Ivan Karadzhov, Ivan Ivanov, Kiril Kotev, and Yordan Todorov, as well as Svetoslav Petrov — was confirmed, even as CSKA faced a Europa League game against Basel on Thursday.

Having lost to Basel 1-3, after a first leg 0-2 defeat against the Swiss team in Sofia in October, Penev immediately announced his resignation upon his return to Bulgaria on Friday.

CSKA Sofia, currently third in the Bulgarian league table, lost its last two league games, 0-3 to Mineur Pernik last week and 0-2 to Litex Lovech on Sunday.