Marked for Benoît Maillard
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad14 Sep 2026
A fracture rules François Aubert out for 29 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Tours will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 24. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match12 Sep 2026
Tours leaking at the back
6 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Nhoa Sangui 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 Tours this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of Louis Boyer at his very best
Marked 8.33. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Tours.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Guilherme Andrade, and the manager let it.
Squad14 Sep 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Nhoa Sangui's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Match12 Sep 2026
It needed Louis Boyer to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Nimes, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
There was one mistake and it ended in the net. Defenders are judged on the worst thing they did rather than on the eighty-nine minutes either side of it, which is unfair and is also the job.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Two goals and a mark of 8.63 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad24 Aug 2026
A fracture rules Charles Schmitt out for 40 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Tours will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market24 Aug 2026
Tours say no — this time
The offer from US Creteil for Guilherme Andrade was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
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.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 5 of the 25 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it were not playing.
Squad24 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 Tours this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match22 Aug 2026
Beaten 3‑4, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Match22 Aug 2026
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Tours and AS Nancy in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad24 Aug 2026
No hiding place for Luc David
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Luc David, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A debut Marcel Roche will not forget — 7.94
There is exactly one of these per career and it does not usually go like this. 1 on the scoresheet, 7.94 beside the name, and a crowd that had never seen him before chanting it by the end.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A brace, and Louis Boyer takes the afternoon — 8.40
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Louis Boyer provided it, and the 8.40 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.06, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
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.
Match1 Aug 2026
Tours get the job done against Dijon
A 5‑3 win over Dijon, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Marcel Roche 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 Tours this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match1 Aug 2026
Guillaume Dubois among the goals in a wild afternoon
8 goals in one match, Guillaume Dubois on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Tours and Dijon.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Tours training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jérôme Martin 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.
The terraces3 Aug 2026
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.