GenesioBruno GENESIO

Presentation

FRANCE FRANCE
BornSep 1, 1966
Lyon, FRANCE
Age58 years old
Arrival(s)
2021 (Coach)
Departure(s)
2023 (Coach)
Career
BesançonBesançonCoach
LyonLyonAssistant coach
LyonLyonCoach
Beijing GuoanBeijing GuoanCoach
RennesRennesCoach
LilleLilleCoach
Born in Lyon, Bruno Genesio began his playing career in 1983 with his hometown club, Olympique Lyonnais. His first two years were spent in the Youth Team, before turning professional in 1985. After starting in the Second Division, he gained promotion to the top flight with Lyon a couple of seasons later. Genesio, who played as a midfielder at Lyon would spend ten years at the club, with a brief interlude at Nice on loan in the 1993/1994 season. He made 171 appearances for the club and scored 12 goals over those ten seasons. In 1995, he quit his hometown to join Martigues, where he would finish his playing career. Having gained a great deal of professional experience and knowledge on the field, he decided to become a coach. Having coached the Youth Team, he landed the job as First-Team Manager at Villefranche sur Saône in the French Fourth Division (CFA) for his first real taste of management in the 1999/2000 season. His first season didn't exactly go to plan, and the second was even worse, leading to him losing his job and the relegation of his team. It wasn't until a few years later that Bruno Genesio finally landed his next role in management, in 2004 with Besançon. But there, it was much the same story, and with results not going his way, he was again released after just a couple of months in the rôle. In 2005, he returned to his hometown, and joined the coaching staff at Lyon as a supervisor. In the 2009/2010 and 2010/2011 season, he took over the Reserve Team at Lyon. In 2011, Rémy Garde, First Team boss at the time, gave him the job of Assistant Manager, a rôle which he would keep for four seasons, the last of which was under Hubert Fournier. On 24th December 2015, when Fournier was sacked, Bruno Genesio was given the top job of First Team Manager. His first match in Ligue 1 was a 4-1 victory over Troyes, the first match ever played at the new Parc OL Stadium. He would stay in this job for four seasons, with some notable scalps in terms of results. Under Genesio, Lyon ; 2nd once, 3rd twice and 4th once, even qualifying for the Europa League Quarter Finals in the 2016/2017 season. In the Summer of 2019, he left Lyon to try his luck in China, where he managed the club Beijing Guan to try and help them win the league title. When he arrived, they were fourth in the league, but with Genesio, the team finished the season as runners-up, just missing out on the title. After a 2020/2021 season which ended with a Semi-Final in the Chinese Super League despite a complex sanitary situation, he left Beijing Guan in January 2021. If Genesio is yet to achieve his first title as a Manager, he has a accumulated a number of good references on the way, and was named First Team Manager at Stade Rennais on 4th March 2021, following the sudden resignation of Julien Stéphan three days earlier, 1st March 2021. After finishing the season with qualification for the Europa Conference League, he had an outstanding 2021/2022 season, and was duly rewarded with the Best Manager Award by the UNFP on May 15th 2022, having broken numerous club records, notably the number of league points for a season, dating back to 2009. On 30th June 2022, Genesio extended his stay at Rennes signing a contract extension tying him to the club until 2025. The 2022/2023 season for Rennes was impacted by the long-term injury to Martin Terrier, and a difficult spell after the return from the World Cup in December. The Red and Blacks slipped away from the podium. But, whilst the style of football offered by Rennes was less attractive than the previous season, Genesio's side managed to turn things around, finishing fourth, thanks to a win at Brest on the last day of the season, leapfrogging Lille and Monaco in the process. The start of the 2023/2024 season would be disappointing for Stade Rennais, notching just two wins out of their first twelve league matches in Ligue 1, albeit they were top of their Europa League group. Despite an honourable record, with 64 wins, 24 draws and 36 defeats in his 124 matches in charge of the team, Genesio, uncertain about his future, decided to end his time in Brittany during the international break, for personal reasons, and his contract was terminated by mutual consent on 19th November 2023. Genesio was then replaced by his predecessor, Julian Stéphan, who arrived on an 8-month contract.