Boldness, more daring, always daring! Can the simple pleasure of the game save French football? Faced with the significant economic crisis that is hitting them, the Professional Football League (LFP) and club presidents have been thinking for several months about very down-to-earth solutions.
All have in common that they are based on a form of austerity: fewer clubs within the elite, fewer players in the workforce, less payroll costs, less taxes, less of everything… But instead of focusing exclusively on the miracle of accounting lines, bank loans and government aid, these decision-makers could also take advantage of the storm to get back to basics: the quality of the show on offer.
This is what invites, for example, Jean-Marc Furlan. For this 63-year-old coach who, since his debut at Libourne in the 1990s, has always advocated a football made of daring and risk, there is an urgent need to think about the game. “In an article by International mail, an Italian journalist wrote that football was not only in danger because of the health crisis, but also because young people are less and less interested in it. They find pleasure elsewhere. How do you attract this youth? And how do you give him emotions? “, wonders the coach of Auxerre.
“A logic of results”
Despite the feeling of sometimes preaching in the desert, which in no way weakens his enthusiasm, the former coach of Troyes and Brest regrets that the French system is so narrow: “It’s a general state of mind. In Germany, in the Netherlands, football is a distraction. We have exclusively a logic of manager, result, he explains. All my coaching buddies tell me: “I attack until I lose a game, then I close the game”. We do not have the culture of emotion. “
At 49, Franck Haise belongs to this young generation of French coaches eager to shake up old habits. After having coached the Lensoise reserve for three years, he was appointed, in 2020, to head the “Blood and Gold”, which he only managed for two matches in Ligue 2, before being offered the challenge. of a season in Ligue 1. “I didn’t change my principles because we were in Ligue 1 and it could be a complicated year. I said, “We’re going to play.” Whatever the results, we have the qualities for and we will not deviate from it ”, tells the one whose playing career oscillated between the second and the third division.
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