Marked for Patrick Leroux
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match29 Aug 2026
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Dijon, and it could have been more.
Market31 Aug 2026
Heidenheim come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Chamois Niortais did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Match29 Aug 2026
5 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Market31 Aug 2026
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Chamois Niortais, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market31 Aug 2026
Le Havre AC pay $1.0M, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Rémi Fournier was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match29 Aug 2026
3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Julien Garnier was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.30. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match22 Aug 2026
6‑1, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market24 Aug 2026
RC Lens come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Chamois Niortais did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad24 Aug 2026
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Pierre Maillard, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.20
A mark of 8.20 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” ASO Chlef had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Toulouse FC keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Match22 Aug 2026
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Patrick Leroux was on a different afternoon to everybody else
10.00. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Market17 Aug 2026
$4.0M from US Creteil for Patrick Perrin. Money is money, but the dressing room has lost the man it looked to.
Market17 Aug 2026
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Bolton Wanderers had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Two goals and a mark of 9.60 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market17 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Pierre Maillard, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.13
A mark of 8.13 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The terraces17 Aug 2026
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Patrick Perrin was one of the reasons people came, and $4.0M does not replace that by itself.
Match15 Aug 2026
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Chamois Niortais training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Patrick Leroux is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad10 Aug 2026
The match ball belongs to Patrick Leroux, whose 6 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Market10 Aug 2026
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
The terraces10 Aug 2026
Supporters turn on the $110.0K sale of Denis Robin
He is going to Valenciennes, the club has $110.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Julien Garnier and Chamois Niortais agree another 4 years.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
The deal with Paris FC is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Patrick Leroux and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Ninety minutes of Patrick Leroux at his very best
Marked 9.94. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Chamois Niortais.
Match8 Aug 2026
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Chamois Niortais and Sochaux in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad3 Aug 2026
4 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Match1 Aug 2026
Stade Lavallois will want this one forgotten quickly: 5‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Chamois Niortais were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Market3 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market3 Aug 2026
Julien Garnier wants to know where this is going
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Chamois Niortais hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad3 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chamois Niortais this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Federico Castro scored one and made one — 7.91
Two of the goals had his name somewhere on them, which is the afternoon a manager wants from anybody asked to both create and finish. 7.91, and 2 involvements.
Match1 Aug 2026
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Chamois Niortais and Stade Lavallois in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A performance of 9.87 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Chamois Niortais training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Patrick Leroux is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.