Marked for Fabien Centonze
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Dec 2026
Patrik Carlgren damages knee ligaments — 29 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 29 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Match19 Dec 2026
No end in sight to FC Nantes's wait for a win
10 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at FC Nantes has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Market21 Dec 2026
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Anthony Martial wants continental football; whether FC Nantes can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad21 Dec 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 FC Nantes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Marked 7.87 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, FC Nantes had the best player on the pitch.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Arnaud Bodart dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Match19 Dec 2026
A 1‑1 draw with Stade Rennais leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad16 Nov 2026
A one-man rearguard from Maxime Dupé
There were 8 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.
Match14 Nov 2026
No end in sight to FC Nantes's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at FC Nantes has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad16 Nov 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 FC Nantes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.28, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at FC Nantes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fabien Centonze 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market2 Nov 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 FC Nantes, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.67 for the rest of it.
Market2 Nov 2026
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at FC Nantes heard it as anything else.
Match31 Oct 2026
Johann Lepenant scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑2 to RC Lens, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Fabien Centonze 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Squad2 Nov 2026
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Squad2 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Fabien Centonze, and the manager let it.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 11. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
No sign of nerves from Ibrahim Mbaye at 18 — 7.64
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ibrahim Mbaye did not need any: 7.64, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Match24 Oct 2026
Whatever happens, FC Nantes do not lose
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Dehmaine Tabibou 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.
The terraces26 Oct 2026
At 23 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.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Abakar Sylla was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.04. 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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Youssef El Arabi, and the manager let it.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Fabien Centonze falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Too much change too quickly at FC Nantes
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Match24 Oct 2026
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad14 Sep 2026
A one-man rearguard from Maxime Dupé
There were 6 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for FC Nantes
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around FC Nantes are no longer polite ones.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a goal for FC Nantes
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match12 Sep 2026
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Rémy Cabella gets it from the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Fabien Centonze falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad14 Sep 2026
7 new faces, and FC Nantes are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Market14 Sep 2026
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Louis Leroux’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Aug 2026
A one-man rearguard from Maxime Dupé
There were 9 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 Aug 2026
The bid was some way short and FC Nantes did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market24 Aug 2026
RC Strasbourg pay $3.1M, 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.
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 FC Nantes this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at FC Nantes training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fabien Centonze 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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 14 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Market24 Aug 2026
Uroš Radaković is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at FC Nantes has been clear about where Uroš Radaković stands, which is more than many ever get.
Squad24 Aug 2026
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.