After the victory against Toulouse (2-1), the Verts’ coach was delighted concerning the performance of his players who fulfilled their duties to the letter.
Does this victory reassure you?
Of course! We’re making progress. We won, we didn’t concede any goals, we created four or five openings to score and we capitalized on two of these openings. For the moment, that’s enough.
What did you especially appreciate today?
My players’ respect for their duties. It was a very precise match that went how I thought it would go. It took place between two teams in the grip of doubt and facing a team that has tall and highly physical players. The main idea was then to prevent these players from making us concede goals and to score by using our offensive assets. It’s for this reason that I had Kévin Théophile-Catherine play right-back, the position he’s trained to play. But that was the day’s line-up, which I put together while bearing in mind the constraints on this match.
Robert Beric showed himself to be decisive...
You have to have confidence in order to take penalty kicks and it’s for this reason that I decided that he should be the one to take them before the match. I can see that he’s hungry and very motivated. His teammates know that he’ll receive their center kicks, just as they know that Loïc Perrin will be there on the defensive line bringing the serenity that he’s known for. Jessy Moulin also performed as I thought he would. Everyone did their job. During the cool-down session, after the match, I saw that everyone was spent. It’s by these behaviours and these values that we will get through this.
Are you satisfied with the higher ranking that this victory has given you in the face of a direct rival?
Today, it was an important match but Wednesday’s match will be as decisive. We can’t lose concentration. It’s not nothing, we’ve won against two teams but it’s not definitive. If we win while not playing on our home turf, we’ll find ourselves in a much better situation. That’s really the most important thing because football was made to make people smile and to bring people happiness.
