Selim Benachour

In this article, the surname is Ben Achour, not Achour.

Selim Benachour

Benachour playing for Málaga in 2010
Personal information
Full name	Slim Ben-Achour
Date of birth	(1981-09-08) 8 September 1981 (age 43)
Place of birth	Paris, France
Height	1.70 m (5 ft 7 in)
Position(s)	Attacking midfielder
Team information
Current team	Tunisia (assistant coach)
Youth career
1995-1998	INF Clairefontaine[1]
1995–2001	Paris Saint-Germain
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
2001–2005	Paris Saint-Germain	28	(1)
2001-2002	→ Martigues (loan)	28	(1)
2003	→ Troyes (loan)	9	(2)
2005–2006	Vitória Guimarães	25	(4)
2006–2008	Rubin Kazan	23	(3)
2008–2009	Al Qadsia	25	(3)
2009–2010	Málaga	22	(0)
2011–2012	Marítimo	33	(5)
2012–2014	APOEL	38	(3)
2015	Mumbai City	11	(1)
2016–2018	FC Martigues	15	(2)
Total		257	(25)
International career
2002–2010	Tunisia	44	(2)
Managerial career
2016–2018	FC Martigues (youth)
2018	Club Africain (assistant)
2018–2019	Foresta Suceava
2020	Olimpia Grudziądz
2020–2021	Oldham Athletic (under-18s)
2021–2022	Oldham Athletic (caretaker)
2022–	Tunisia (assistant)
Medal record Men's football Representing  Tunisia Africa Cup of Nations Winner 2004 Tunisia
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Selim Benachour (Arabic: سليم بن عاشور, Salīm bin ʻĀshūr; born Slim Ben-Achour on 8 September 1981) is a football coach and former professional player who played as a attacking midfielder. He is an assistant coach for the Tunisia national team.

Born in France, he represented France at youth international level before playing for Tunisia at senior international level.

Club career

Paris Saint-Germain

Born and brought up in Paris, Selim Benachour learned to play his trade at the Paris Saint-Germain academy. Benachour began his professional club career with Paris Saint-Germain in 2001 and stayed in the club until 2005.

After his two loan transfers, he went back to PSG after this, playing on and off for them over the next two seasons. Overall he earned 28 caps for his childhood club, scoring one goal.

With PSG, he appeared in 28 league matches and scored a goal,^[2] alongside winning the Coupe de France in 2004.^[3]

Out on loan from PSG

He was given twice on loan from Paris Saint-Germain to Martigues in 2001-2002 and Troyes in 2003. He was sent to French Division 2 club Martigues on a season long loan spell. He played regularly for the Martigues first team, scoring one goal in 28 appearances. Next season he was sent on loan to Ligue 2 side ES Troyes AC, who had just narrowly avoided bankruptcy and were just trying to survive for the time being. Benachour had trouble getting into their team, making 9 appearances over the season, scoring twice.^[4]

Vitoria

In 2005, he left France and moved to Portugal, signing with Vitória Guimarães, where he enjoyed one successful season at the club.

Rubin Kazan

The next season, he signed a contract with the Russian side Rubin Kazan, where he played for two seasons and appeared in 23 league matches, scoring 3 goals. He was in Kazan's 2006 La Manga Cup winning squad.

Al Qadsia

After two seasons with Kazan, he moved to Kuwait and signed for Kuwaiti Premier League side Al Qadsia and played there until 2009. With Qadsia, he won the 2008–09 Kuwaiti Premier League.

Malaga

In 2009, he signed with the Spanish La Liga side Málaga. On 13 September 2010 he was not registered to play in La Liga and was released by the club, with one year still left on his contract.^[5]

Maritimo

On 21 January 2011, he returned to Portugal and signed a contract with the Marítimo until the end of the 2011–2012 season.^[6]

APOEL

On 16 June 2012, Benachour signed a two-year contract with the Cypriot club APOEL.^[7] On 23 August 2012, he scored his first goal with APOEL in a Europa League play-off round match against Neftchi Baku in Dalga Arena, equalising the score in the 83rd minute, in a match which ended with 1–1 draw.^[8] He became a champion with APOEL after helping his club to win the 2012–13 Cypriot First Division. During the 2013–14 season, he appeared in two 2013–14 UEFA Europa League group stage matches for APOEL and won all the titles in Cyprus, the Cypriot League,^[9][10] the Cypriot Cup^[11][12] and the Cypriot Super Cup.^[13][14]

Mumbai City

On 28 July 2015, he signed for Indian Super League club Mumbai City FC managed by his former teammate Nicolas Anelka.^[15][16][17] With Mumbai, he appeared in 11 matches with 3 assists and 1 goal,^[18] as the club finished 6th in the 2015 Indian Super League season.

Martigues

After the end of his stint with Mumbai, he came back to France in 2016 and signed with Championnat National 2 side FC Martigues. From 2016 to 2018, he appeared in 15 league matches with Martigues, scoring 2 goals.

International career

Benachour played for France national teams at youth level from under-15 to under-20. In June 2001, after playing the Toulon Tournament with Raymond Domenech as a coach, he refused to play the under-20 World Cup for France.^[19]

He made his international debut on 11 January 2002 against Cameroon in a friendly match which ended as their 1-0 defeat.^[20] Between 2002 and 2010, he earned 44 caps for Tunisia and scored 2 goals.

He was widely considered one of Tunisia's best players, an elegant playmaker with range of passing and great vision, and played for Tunisia's national squad at the 2002 World Cup. However, he was not included in the squad for the 2006 World Cup in Germany, in which Tunisia were knocked out in the first round. He was part of the national squad that emerged as the champions of the 2004 African Cup of Nations, defeating Morocco.^[21][22]

Managerial career

Overall, he made over 250 appearances at senior level throughout his career before retiring and in 2016, Benachour became the head coach at Martigues FC U17, where he won the Provincial Cup and then came runners-up in the league before moving up to the U19 team. Later he joined Foresta Suceava in Romania as manager and guided the club to a fifth-place finish.^[23]

He then occupied the post of technical director as well as briefly the head coach role at Olimpia Grudziądz in Poland's top division.

Moving to England, the UEFA A licence holder Benachour took up the position of under-18s manager at Oldham Athletic in September 2020.^[24]

He became caretaker first team head coach of Oldham Athletic on 24 November 2021, following the departure of Keith Curle.

Career statistics

International goals

Scores and results list Tunisia's goal tally first.^[25][26]

No.	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	1 February 2004	Stade Olympique de Radès, Radès	Guinea	1–0	1–1	2004 African Nations Cup
2.	26 January 2006	Stade de l'Amitié, Harras El-Hedoud Stadium, Alexandria	South Africa	2–0	2–0	2006 African Nations Cup

Managerial statistics

As of 22 January 2022

Managerial record by team and tenure

Team	From	To	Record					Ref.
			P	W	D	L	Win %
Foresta Suceava	15 August 2018	8 April 2019	20	8	6	6	040.0	[27]
Olimpia Grudziądz	1 July 2020	31 July 2020	6	0	2	4	000.0	[28]
Oldham Athletic	24 November 2021	22 January 2022	9	1	3	5	011.1	[29]
Total			35	9	11	15	025.7

Honours

Country

Tunisia under-21

• Mediterranean Games: 2001

Tunisia

• Africa Cup of Nations: 2004^[30]

Club

Paris Saint-Germain

• Coupe de France: 2004^[31]

Qadsia

• Kuwaiti Premier League: 2008–09

APOEL

• Cypriot First Division: 2012–13, 2013–14
• Cypriot Cup: 2013–14
• Cypriot Super Cup: 2013

Personal life

Benachour was born in Paris, France, and is multilingual. He speaks fluent French, English, Spanish and Portuguese.

References

1. Lefèvre, Florian (31 December 2016). "Benachour : " C'était un déchirement de ne pas réussir à Paris "" [Benachour: "It was tearing for not succeeding in Paris"]. sofoot.com (in French). Retrieved 19 July 2018.
2. "BENACHOUR : " C'ÉTAIT UN DÉCHIREMENT DE NE PAS RÉUSSIR À PARIS "". sofoot.com. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
3. Report on French federation site (PSG 1 – 0 Châteauroux) fff.fr. Retrieved 24 March 2021
4. "Selim Benachour, Tunisian football hero joins Mumbai City". the-fan-garage.com. 28 July 2015. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
5. El Málaga Club de Fútbol acuerda con Selim Benachour su desvinculación Archived 16 September 2010 at the Wayback Machine; Málagacf.com, 13.9-2010 (in Spanish)
6. Benachour assina até ao final da época 2011/2012; csmartimo.pt, 21.1–2011 (in Portuguese)
7. "Προκαταρκτική Συμφωνία με Selim Benachour" (in Greek). APOEL FC. Retrieved 16 June 2012.
8. "Neftçi 1–1 APOEL". UEFA. Retrieved 23 August 2012.
9. "Sheridan strike hands APOEL Cypriot title". UEFA. 31 May 2014. Retrieved 31 May 2014.
10. "AEL vs. APOEL 0-1". Soccerway. 31 May 2014. Retrieved 31 May 2014.
11. ΕΡΜΗΣ ΑΡΑΔΙΠΠΟΥ 0-2 ΑΠΟΕΛ (in Greek). APOEL FC. 21 May 2014. Retrieved 21 May 2014.
12. "APOEL vs. Ermis 2-0". Soccerway. 21 May 2014. Retrieved 21 May 2014.
13. "APOEL FC 1-0 APOLLON". APOEL FC. 17 August 2013. Retrieved 17 August 2013.
14. "APOEL vs. Apollon 1-0". Soccerway. 17 August 2013. Retrieved 17 August 2013.
15. "Benachour joins former team-mate Anelka at Mumbai City". Goal. Retrieved 28 July 2015.
16. "ISL: Mumbai City FC sign Tunisia's Selim Benachour". India Today. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
17. "Mumbai City Squad". indiansuperleague.com. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
18. Selim Benachour with Mumbai City in the Indian Super League indiansuperleague.com. Retrieved 24 March 2021
19. Opoczynski, David (7 June 2001). "Benachour : " Je suis soulagé "". leparisien.fr (in French). Retrieved 17 July 2023.
20. Selim Benachour with Tunisia national football team: games and statistics National-Football-Teams. Retrieved 24 March 2021
21. UEFA.com (14 February 2004). "Tunisia delight in African triumph | Inside UEFA". UEFA.com. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
22. "Classement buteurs CAN 2004 Coupe d'afrique des nations 2004 informations, résultats, photos..." coupedafrique.winoo.com. Retrieved 15 March 2021.
23. "Benachour Becomes New Youth Team Manager". oldhamathletic.co.uk. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
24. Benachour Becomes New Youth Team Manager
25. "African Nations Cup 2004". RSSSF. Retrieved 15 March 2021.
26. "African Nations Cup 2006". RSSSF. Retrieved 24 March 2021.
27. "Romania - ACS Foresta Suceava - Results, fixtures, squad, statistics, photos, videos and news - Soccerway".
28. "Poland - GKS Olimpia Grudziądz - Results, fixtures, squad, statistics, photos, videos and news - Soccerway".
29. "Selim Benachour - Soccerbase".
30. "Tunisia win Cup of Nations". BBC Sport. 14 February 2004. Retrieved 14 March 2011.
31. "Résultat et résumé Paris-SG – Châteauroux, Coupe de France, Finale, Samedi 29 Mai 2004". lequipe.fr. Retrieved 26 February 2021.

External links

• APOEL official profile
• Selim Benachour at National-Football-Teams.com
• Selim Benachour at Soccerway
• Interview-biography (in Russian)