Mali national team coach Alain Giresse had quit the national team after elimination in the group stages of  2017 Africa Cup of Nations held in Gabon Soka25east can reveal.

In a decision that might anger many who want Giresse out, the country’s Sports Ministry  refused to accept a verbal offer of resignation from the national team coach.

By declining to accept Giresse’s resignation goverment averted what could have been protracted and costly lawsuit aganist the football federation.

In January Giresse had not only volunteered to step down but also told his bosses that he will meet them in court for breach of contractual agreements and deliberately making his working conditions difficult — “basically setting him up to fail”.

Giresse was not throwing in the towel, nor was his offer to resign motivated by a media campaign to oust him. According to those close to him, the coach was fed up with unfulfilled promises to meet his demands, some of which were for things guaranteed in his contract.

Giresse was open about the fact that Femafoot has constantly reneged on a contractual agreement in his second spell that began in 2015, to allow him to bring in his own technical staff, insisting that he uses locals. His relationship with these local appointees did not seem to be cordial, although it is unclear whose fault it.

On the other side, Employer but not paymaker, the federation found himself faced with a situation without solution for him. The contract of Giresse running until next November, the Femafoot was obliged to keep the French technician after the Sports ministry department that pays his salary refused to let the gaffer go, a decision that has made the tactician to stay.