Former Fulham goalkeeper coach Hugo Oliveira is a surprise early runner in the stakes to succeed Marco Silva as manager.
Silva departed Craven Cottage on Monday after five years in charge to join Portuguese giants Benfica after his contract expired.
Work has begun on assembling a list of contenders to take over from Silva with club owner Shahid Khan in talks with other members of the hierarchy.
Names have been circulated among Fulham‘s top brass recently as speculation mounted that Silva was going to leave but the serious job of ranking potential new managers is now beginning in earnest.
Oliveira should be know to Fulham fans
And Oliveira is well liked in the Craven Cottage boardroom even though he is not widely known among football fans at large.
He will face stiff competition for the sought-after post from much bigger names in the game. Ipswich Town’s Kieran McKenna is already being mentioned as a possible contender for the job.
Yet supporters of Fulham may well remember Oliveira as the goalkeeping coach under Silva.
He first joined Silva’s backroom team at Hull City and followed him to South West London where he was very popular and highly rated.
Oliveira, 46, left the Premier League in 2024 for personal reasons to go back to his homeland and pursue his ambition to become a manager in his own right.
In December of that year he took over as head coach of Primera Liga side Famalicao where he has been ever since.
He guided them to fifth place last season and that has helped place him on Khan’s radar as the process of sifting through candidates gets underway.
Silva has walked straight into a new job after leaving Fulham
Silva has left and signed a three-year contract with Benfica while taking a pay cut in the process.
The Portuguese is joining on wages of around £6.2million a year (€7million). But he told club bosses he wanted to go home for personal reasons too.
Benfica will also compete in Champions League qualifying after finishing third in the table. Silva is replacing Jose Mourinho who has left to rejoin Real Madrid.
Fulham’s pre-season plans are in place after a series of meetings between Silva and his bosses in recent weeks and he goes on good terms.
Silva even thrashed out a summer transfer strategy for the club before informing them this week that he has decided against signing a new three year deal to remain in England and will go home instead.
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