Marked for Quentin Carpentier
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match20 Sep 2028
Stade Rennais ended it 1‑2. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Defensive actions: 30, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Nehemiah Fernandez was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Marked 9.09 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Match23 Sep 2028
Three points for AS Nancy, 2‑0 the final word against Valenciennes in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad25 Sep 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Miłosz Piekutowski, and the manager let it.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Defensive actions: 19, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.19, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Sep 2028
Jérémy Gélin in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Nancy this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market18 Sep 2028
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Quentin Carpentier is a AS Nancy player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
Squad18 Sep 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Patrick Ouotro, and the manager let it.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.64, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
Marked 8.27 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad18 Sep 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Michael Mortume and AS Nancy agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match16 Sep 2028
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
Shots: 8, enough of them from close enough that a striker in form scores two. He is not a striker in form.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match22 Jan 2028
The wait goes on for Red Star
18 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Market24 Jan 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Red Star can pretend not to have heard.
Squad24 Jan 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Red Star may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad24 Jan 2028
There were 7 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market24 Jan 2028
The phone has started ringing about Islamdine Halifa again, and this time the name on the line is Dijon. Red Star are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Nathan Ngoy was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Market24 Jan 2028
The shirt still fits. Quentin Carpentier is back at Red Star, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Market24 Jan 2028
As if he never left: Nolhann Bélise returns
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Nolhann Bélise is a Red Star player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
Match22 Jan 2028
AJ Auxerre left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.