Fayed: I will stand by Tigana

Mohamed Fayed today gave Jean Tigana a huge vote of confidence, and then revealed he had made it clear to his manager how disappointed he was with Fulham's league form this season.

Rumours have spread within football the Harrods owner and Fulham chairman wants to replace the Frenchman after his expensively-assembled team were drawn into a relegation battle.

They were fuelled when, as revealed by Standard Sport, Fulham published accounts showing record losses of £24 million in the year to the end of last June.

Tigana has spent more than £30m in the transfer market since then and Fayed confirmed he was angry about the return he was getting on his money.

Fayed said: "I expressed my disappointment to the manager. However, there has been much ill-informed speculation that because we suffered a poor run of results which took us into a relegation battle I was about to sack Jean. What kind of logic would that make?

"I appointed Jean because of his magnificent managerial record in France and he was rated by experts as potentially one of the world's top five coaches.

"We knew our first season in the Premiership would be tough. It was going to be a hard, learning experience for the players and for the manager. So it has proved, but Jean is learning fast."

Fayed: Fulham spending will go on