Vardan Martun Ghazaryan (; ; born 1 December 1969) is a

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 ...

coach and former player. Born in Armenia, Ghazaryan moved to Lebanon and obtained

citizenship Citizenship is a membership and allegiance to a sovereign state. Though citizenship is often conflated with nationality in today's English-speaking world, international law does not usually use the term ''citizenship'' to refer to nationalit ...

through naturalisation in 1994. He played for Homenetmen and Sagesse as a striker, and represented

Lebanon Lebanon, officially the Republic of Lebanon, is a country in the Levant region of West Asia. Situated at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian Peninsula, it is bordered by Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south ...

internationally from 1995 until 2001. Ghazaryan is the second-highest all-time scorer in the Lebanese Premier League, scoring 117 official league goals. He is also the second-highest scorer for the national team with 21 goals, after having been surpassed by Hassan Maatouk in 2023. Ghazaryan was appointed manager of Tripoli in 2017 for one year. He returned to Sagesse as head coach in 2021.

Club career

Ghazaryan started his senior career in 1989 in Armenia, at Spartak Hoktemberyan, before moving to

Kapan Kapan ( ) is a town in southeast Armenia, serving as the administrative centre of the Kapan Municipality and also as the provincial capital of Syunik Province. It is located in the valley of the Voghji (river), Voghji River and is on the norther ...

in 1990. In 1992 he moved to Lebanon, joining Homenetmen Beirut.Alt URL
/ref> He stayed there for seven years, before moving to Sagesse in 1999. He spent three years there, before moving back to Homenetmen in 2002. Ghazaryan then joined Sagesse once again, in 2005, before retiring in 2009 aged 39. His first goal in the Lebanese Premier League came on 23 January 1993, when he scored the second goal for Homenetmen against Tadamon Sour in the 54th minute. Ghazaryan was named AFC Player of the Month for January 1996. On 16 November 2008, at 39 years old, Ghazaryan scored his 129th goal in the Lebanese Premier League against Tadamon Sour, becoming the highest all-time scorer in the league. However, some do not recognise the 12 goals he scored in the 2000–01 season, which was canceled, making him the second-highest top-goalscorer with 117 goals, behind Fadi Alloush's total of 120.

International career

Having moved to Lebanon from Armenia, Ghazaryan obtained Lebanese citizenship through naturalisation in 1994. He was the top goalscorer in the history of the Lebanon national team, with 21 goals (four in World Cup qualifiers, three in

Asian Cup The AFC Asian Cup is the primary association football competition contested by the senior list of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the members of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), determining the contin ...

qualifiers and 14 in friendlies). In 2023, Ghazaryan was surpassed by Hassan Maatouk.

Managerial career

In 2009, Ghazaryan returned to his native Armenia where he trained an Armenian club; he moved back to Lebanon four years later. Ghazaryan became the assistant coach for Tripoli, before being appointed head coach in 2017. In July 2021, ahead of the 2021 Lebanese Challenge Cup, Ghazaryan was appointed head coach of Lebanese Premier League side Sagesse, for whom he had already played as a player.

Career statistics

International

: ''Scores and results list Lebanon's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Ghazaryan goal''.

Honours

Player

Syunik Kapan * Armenian SSR League:

1991 It was the final year of the Cold War, which had begun in 1947. During the year, the Soviet Union Dissolution of the Soviet Union, collapsed, leaving Post-soviet states, fifteen sovereign republics and the Commonwealth of Independent State ...

Homenetmen * Lebanese Second Division: 2002–03 Individual * IFFHS All-time Lebanon Men's Dream Team * AFC Player of the Month: January 1996 * Lebanese Premier League Best Player: 1996–97 * Lebanese Premier League Team of the Season: 1996–97, 1999–2000

Notes

References

External links

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Vardan Ghazaryan
at

RSSSF The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation (''RSSSF'') is an international organisation dedicated to collecting statistics about association football. The foundation aims to build an exhaustive archive of football-related information from around ...

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Ghazaryan, Vardan 1969 births Living people People from Kapan Soviet Armenians Soviet men's footballers Lebanese men's footballers Lebanese football managers Lebanon men's international footballers Armenian men's footballers Armenian football managers Armenian emigrants to Lebanon Naturalized citizens of Lebanon Men's association football forwards FC Armavir (Armenia) players FC Lernagorts Kapan players Homenetmen Beirut (football) players Sagesse SC (football) players Armenian Premier League players Lebanese Premier League players Lebanese Second Division players Asian Games competitors for Lebanon Footballers at the 1998 Asian Games 2000 AFC Asian Cup players AC Tripoli managers Sagesse SC (football) managers Lebanese Premier League managers Association football coaches International sportspeople born abroad Naturalised association football players