Francisco Manuel "Paco" Soler Atencia (born 5 March 1970) is a Spanish former

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

central midfielder In the sport of association football, a midfielder takes an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield position primarily in the middle of the pitch. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in t ...

and manager. He only played with

Mallorca Mallorca, or Majorca, is the largest of the Balearic Islands, which are part of Spain, and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, seventh largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. The capital of the island, Palma, Majorca, Palma, i ...

during his career, amassing

La Liga The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División, commonly known as the Primera División or La Liga, and officially known as LaLiga EA Sports for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Spain and the highest ...

totals of 168 matches and three goals over nine seasons and spending 14 years with the first team. He subsequently became a coach.

Club career

A hard-nosed player, Soler was born in

Palma de Mallorca Palma (, ; ), also known as Palma de Mallorca (officially between 1983 and 1988, 2006–2008, and 2012–2016), is the capital and largest city of the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of the Balearic Islands in Spain. It is ...

Balearic Islands The Balearic Islands are an archipelago in the western Mediterranean Sea, near the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. The archipelago forms a Provinces of Spain, province and Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Spain, ...

, and spent his entire career with local club

RCD Mallorca Real Club Deportivo Mallorca, Sociedad Anónima Deportiva, S.A.D. (, , ''Royal Sporting Club Mallorca''), commonly known as Real Mallorca or RCD Mallorca, is a Spanish professional association football, football club based in Palma de Mallorca, ...

. He made his first-team debut in the 1990–91 season, and went on to make 419 competitive appearances for them. In 1996–97, Soler was instrumental in helping Mallorca return to

, and also appeared regularly the following campaign as the team finished fifth. He was named on the substitutes bench for the final of the 1998–99 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup. In his final two years, however, Soler played almost no part in the side's lineups, and retired after 2003–04 at the age of 34. Subsequently he took up coaching and, in January 2007, was appointed at Portuguese

Primeira Liga The Primeira Liga (), also known as Liga Portugal Betclic for sponsorship reasons, is a professional association football league in Portugal and the highest level of the Portuguese football league system. Organised and supervised by the Liga ...

club S.C. Beira-Mar after it signed a cooperation deal with Inverfutbol, a Spanish-based sporting company, not being able to help the Aveiro team avoid relegation. In February 2009, Soler returned to his native region, replacing former Spanish international

Francisco Francisco is the Spanish and Portuguese form of the masculine given name ''Franciscus''. Meaning of the name Francisco In Spanish, people with the name Francisco are sometimes nicknamed "Paco (name), Paco". Francis of Assisi, San Francisco de A ...

at the helm of lowly CD Atlético Baleares and suffering another relegation. Four years later, he left his post as

director of football A sporting director, or director of sport, is an senior management, executive management position in a sports club. The role is well known as a manager role for European football clubs, which are sometime also "sports clubs", offering many typ ...

and again became their manager.

International career

Soler was part of the Spain squad that won the gold medal at the

1992 Summer Olympics The 1992 Summer Olympics (, ), officially the Games of the XXV Olympiad (, ) and officially branded as Barcelona '92, were an international multi-sport event held from 25 July to 9 August 1992 in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Beginning in 1994 ...

Barcelona Barcelona ( ; ; ) is a city on the northeastern coast of Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second-most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...

, appearing in four matches for a total of 277 minutes.

Honours

Mallorca *

Copa del Rey The , commonly known as , or (in English) the Spanish Cup or King's Cup, and formerly known as Copa del Presidente de la República (1932–1936) and Copa del Generalísimo (1939–1976), is an annual knockout football competition in Spanis ...

: 2002–03; runner-up: 1997–98 *

Supercopa de España The Supercopa de España, also known as the Spanish Super Cup, is a super cup tournament in Football in Spain, Spanish football. Founded in 1982 Supercopa de España, 1982 as a two-team competition, the current version has been contested since 2 ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...

UEFA Cup Winners' Cup The UEFA Cup Winners' Cup was a European association football, football club competition contested annually by the winners of domestic cup competitions. The competition's official name was originally the European Cup Winners' Cup; it was renam ...

runner-up: 1998–99 Spain U23 *

Summer Olympic Games The Summer Olympic Games, also known as the Summer Olympics or the Games of the Olympiad, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The 1896 Summer Olympics, inaugural Games took place in 1896 in Athens, ...

1992 1992 was designated as International Space Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 – Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt replaces Javier Pérez de Cuéllar of Peru as United Nations Secretary-General. * January 6 ** The Republ ...

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Soler, Paco 1970 births Living people Spanish men's footballers Footballers from Palma de Mallorca Men's association football midfielders La Liga players Segunda División players Segunda División B players Tercera División players RCD Mallorca B players RCD Mallorca players Spain men's under-23 international footballers Olympic footballers for Spain Footballers at the 1992 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics Olympic medalists in football Olympic gold medalists for Spain Spanish football managers Segunda División B managers CD Atlético Baleares managers Primeira Liga managers S.C. Beira-Mar managers Spanish expatriate football managers Expatriate football managers in Portugal Spanish expatriate sportspeople in Portugal

Club career

International career

Honours

See also

References

External links