Farid Benstiti (born 16 January 1967) is a French football coach and former player who played as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

. He last managed

OL Reign OL Reign is an American professional women's soccer team based in Seattle, Washington. Founded by Bill and Teresa Predmore in 2012 as Seattle Reign FC, it was one of eight inaugural members of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). In 2020, ...

in the National Women's Soccer League. Benstiti started his playing career in 1984 for Olympique Lyonnais. In 1989, he moved to Cercle Dijon, and he subsequently played for

AS Lyon-Duchère As, AS, A. S., A/S or similar may refer to: Art, entertainment, and media * A. S. Byatt (born 1936), English critic, novelist, poet and short story writer * "As" (song), by Stevie Wonder * , a Spanish sports newspaper * , an academic male voic ...

FC Sète FC may refer to: Businesses, organisations, and schools * Fergusson College, a science and arts college in Pune, India * Finncomm Airlines (IATA code) * FranklinCovey company, NYSE stock symbol FC * Frontier Corps, a paramilitary force in Paki ...

and Avenir Lembeek in the French and

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third tiers, and Vaulx-en-Velin and Gap FC in lower categories. He retired in 2000 at 33. Benstiti is best known for his managerial career in women's football, which started in 2001 as he was appointed Olympique Lyonnais' manager. Under Benstiti Olympique won four championships in a row between 2007 and 2010 and reached the 2010 Champions League's final, lost to

Turbine Potsdam 1. Frauenfußballclub Turbine Potsdam 71 e. V., commonly known as 1. FFC Turbine Potsdam (or Turbine Potsdam outside of Germany), is a German women's football club located in Potsdam, Brandenburg. They are one of the most successful women's footb ...

on penalties. However, he left the position after the 2010 season. In September 2011 he signed for the Russian national team and months later he also took charge of Russian champion

WFC Rossiyanka WFC Rossiyanka was a Russian women's football club from Khimki. History The team was founded in 1990 as Nadezhda Krasnoarmeysk, being initially a futsal club. Futsal was played until 1998, when the club left it to concentrate in association fo ...

, replacing

Vera Pauw Vera Pauw (; born 18 January 1963) is a Dutch football coach and former player. She currently manages the Republic of Ireland women's national football team. She has managed several national women's football teams, including Scotland, Netherland ...

and Tatiana Egorova respectively. In July 2012 he left both positions and returned to France for personal reasons. He then signed for Paris Saint-Germain. On 22 Dec 2016, Chinese club Dalian Quanjian officially signed Benstiti as their new manager. On 17 January 2020, Benstiti was appointed the head coach of

Reign FC OL Reign is an American professional women's soccer team based in Seattle, Washington. Founded by Bill and Teresa Predmore in 2012 as Seattle Reign FC, it was one of eight inaugural members of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). In 2020, ...

. He resigned on July 2, 2021; Benstiti was later named in the

Yates Report The ''Yates Report'', officially titled ''Report of the Independent Investigation to the U.S. Soccer Federation Concerning Allegations of Abusive Behavior and Sexual Misconduct in Women's Professional Soccer'', is the official report documenting ...

for abusive behavior regarding weight-shaming players.

References

1966 births Living people Footballers from Lyon French footballers Association football midfielders French football managers Expatriate football managers in Russia National team coaches French sportspeople of Algerian descent Olympique Lyonnais Féminin managers Russia women's national football team managers Paris Saint-Germain Féminine managers Dalian Quanjian F.C. managers Expatriate football managers in China OL Reign coaches National Women's Soccer League coaches FC Vaulx-en-Velin players {{France-footy-bio-stub