Real Madrid are set to name Vanderlei Luxemburgo, coach of Brazilian champions Santos, as their third new coach this season, Spanish media reports said on Thursday.
Former Brazil coach Luxemburgo was travelling to Madrid on Thursday and will replace Mariano Garcia Remon on the Madrid bench, the web sites of sports daily Marca and of newspaper El Mundo said.
A Real Madrid official would neither confirm nor deny the news but said the club was holding a board meeting later on Thursday which would be followed by a news conference.
Brazilian media quoted Santos Vice President Norberto Moreira da Silva as saying: "He [Luxemburgo] told us he had an offer he could not refuse and asked to be freed from his commitment to Santos. It was his dream so we thought it best to let him go."
HEAVY PRESSURE
Garcia Remon, at the helm for just three months, has been under heavy pressure after the star-studded team's recent poor performances which has seen them slump to fifth in the Spanish Primera Liga, 13 points behind pace-setters and arch rivals Barcelona.
Garcia Remon was named Real Madrid's coach in September when Jose Antonio Camacho resigned four months after taking up the post, saying he felt incapable of getting the most out of the club's expensively assembled squad.
Real Madrid, whose roster of star players includes Ronaldo, Raul, Zinedine Zidane, Figo, David Beckham and Michael Owen, closed a miserable year with a 1-0 defeat at home to Sevilla last week.
Real Madrid goalkeeper Iker Casillas said after that loss that another slip-up would end the former European champions' hopes of winning the Spanish league title.
Real recently appointed former AC Milan and Italy coach Arrigo Sacchi as director of football. Only last week, Sacchi gave his backing to Garcia Remon, saying "we have full confidence in him".
Luxemburgo's reported move to Madrid comes less than two weeks after Santos won the Brazilian championship for the second time in three years.
Luxemburgo won the title for the second year in a row, having led Cruzeiro to the championship last year for the fifth title of his career.
He also won the competition with Palmeiras in 1993 and 1994 and Corinthians in 1998.
Luxemburgo was coach of Brazil between 1998 and 2000.
(Additional reporting by Nicholas Winning)
