Fulham reported to have sacked Alan Curbishley and Ray Wilkins

LONDON. KAZINFORM - The turmoil at Fulham continued with reports that the club had sacked their technical director, Alan Curbishley, and assistant manager, Ray Wilkins, following the appointment of Felix Magath as manager on Friday, although the future of René Meulensteen remains shrouded in uncertainty.
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Curbishley, who was brought into the club over Christmas by the Fulham chief executive, Alistair Mackintosh, is believed to have left with Wilkins, who also joined in December, following the arrival of Magath and his backroom staff last week.

The departures represent fresh upheaval at Fulham this season, with the owner, Shahid Khan, opting to take decisive action with the club bottom of the Premier League and four points adrift of safety.

Neither Meulensteen nor Wilkins attended Magath's first training session at the weekend, although Curbishley met the German and there were suggestions that he could remain in his position. However, Sky Sports News reported that he and Wilkins had been relieved of their duties at Craven Cottage.

Despite repeated attempts by the Guardian, Fulham were unavaliable for comment last night, according to The Guardian.

Magath, who has won the Bundesliga on three occasions during spells with Bayern Munich and Wolfsburg, will take charge of Fulham for the first time on Saturday for the game against 17th-placed West Brom.

Meulensteen, who had been in his role as head coach for only 75 days before Friday, faces a fight to secure a pay-off from Fulham despite being on a contract until 2015. The Dutchman said last week that he had been "released" by the club but Fulham maintain that he has not been sacked, merely relieved of his first-team duties.

A number of Fulham players spoke on Monday about Magath's appointment, including the on-loan midfielder Lewis Holtby, who was sent on loan by Magath twice during his time with Schalke.

"I don't have any fear. I have grown as a player and my time under Magath is already almost five years away. We are both in Fulham to reach one goal and that is staying up. Everything else is secondary," Holtby told Bild.

"At the weekend I was in Denmark visiting my girlfriend's family. I booked a flight for Sunday afternoon but since the first training session under Felix Magath was scheduled on such short notice for Sunday morning I had to return a day early. The news was, of course, a big surprise."

The defender Sacha Riether, who worked with Magath at Wolfsburg, said his new manager's reputation as a taskmaster will benefit Fulham in their attempts to remain in the top-flight.

He said: "We are last in the table and I know how Felix Magath works. I had it [for] three years in Germany. We have to work hard but we will have success. He has to get to know all the players and the teams and all that is around the team.

"But in Germany he never got relegated with all the teams and he knows how to handle difficult situations, so I hope he will handle our situation as well. I trained very hard for three years but we were champions in Germany with Wolfsburg and he had a lot of success with Bayern Munich as well. I hope we will have success with Fulham."

Magath is Fulham's third manager of the season, with the club having sacked Martin Jol on 1 December.

It has been announced that fellow Premier League strugglers Cardiff City will host this year's Uefa Super Cup final.

The match will take place on 12 August and will feature the winners of this season's Champions League and Europa League. The Cardiff City Stadium will increase its capacity by 6,000 to 33,000 before the final.

Cardiff's manager, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who scored Manchester United's winning goal in the 1999 Champions League final, said: "It's an absolutely stunning stadium. It's a game the players will remember for the passion."

Expressing pride at the city's staging of the event, the Football Association of Wales chief executive, Jonathan Ford, said: "This will be the first match staged on behalf of Uefa in the Welsh capital. We are sure it will not be the last."

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