Pako Ayestarán (Beasáin, Guipúzcoa,1963) is to be the new Las Palmas manager, following agreement this evening. He replaces Manolo Márquez on the manager’s bench, following the latter’s resignation. .
Ayestarán has trained CD Estudiantes Tecos, with whom he won the Torneo de Apertura championship, and Maccabi Tel Aviv, leading them to an unprecedented treble in Israeli football (the league, ha'Al, an Israeli cup and the Toto cup), as well as Santos Laguna and Valencia.
He began his managerial career at Beasáin and Tolosa, both third division teams. He later moved onto the position of physio under Rafa Benítez at Club Atlético Osasuna, in the 96-97 season. His next clubs were Extremadura, Tenerife and Valencia, from 2001 to 2004. That year he moved onto Liverpool with Rafa Benítez once more, with whom he worked closely until September 2007. The following season he worked with Quique Sánchez Flores at Benfica and then the following year returned to Valencia with Unai Emery. He was to coincide once more with Sánchez Flores, a year later, this time at Al-Ahli FC in the United Arab Emirates, in the 2011-2012 season, winning the league cup there.
In 2013 he began his first team managerial career with Estudiantes Tecos in Mexico. In August 2014 he took over the hot seat at Maccabi Tel Aviv. A year later, he managed Mexican team Club Santos Laguna. In February 2016 he came back for a third stint at Valencia, as assistant manager under Gary Neville. Just two months later, he replaced Neville following the Briton’s sacking. Three wins on the run saved Valencia from relegation that year.
Ayestarán arrives at UD Las Palmas accompanied by two assistants, David Caneda and José Viela. Paquito Ortiz will continue to work with the technical team.
His presentation will be tomorrow at 18.30, at the stadium’s press room. He will hold his first training session on Friday. On Saturday, the team travel to Barcelona, where they will be playing the seventh league match of the season against the high flying Catalonian team on Sunday at 15.15 Canary time.
