Philippe Laurent

Attacking Midfielder (L) - Valenciennes U18
28 Dec 2028
Thursday
Process

Marked for Philippe Laurent

56 Edition

The Valenciennes Post

23 Aug 2027
From our football correspondent Crisis

Match

The wait goes on for Valenciennes

9 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.

Market

Mabrouk Rouaï asks to leave Valenciennes

“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.

Squad

Bryan Passi: that is not what I was promised

“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valenciennes have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Squad

Real improvement from Noah Nsoki at Valenciennes

Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Noah Nsoki is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.

Squad

Mabrouk Rouaï 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 Valenciennes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Boardroom

5 academy players handed senior numbers at Valenciennes

The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.

Squad

Charles Abi has improved at 27, which nobody expected

Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.

Market

Valenciennes promote Philippe Laurent from within

The academy exists for exactly this morning. Philippe Laurent has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.

Market

Valenciennes promote David Giraud from within

The academy exists for exactly this morning. David Giraud has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.

In brief