Marked for Alexandre Pierre
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad17 Sep 2029
A fracture rules Julien Vetro out for 38 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sochaux will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market17 Sep 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sochaux is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The dugout17 Sep 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Match15 Sep 2029
5 matches without a win for Sochaux
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Sochaux are no longer polite ones.
Squad17 Sep 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Alexandre Pierre commits to Sochaux for another 4 years.
Squad17 Sep 2029
A falling-out at Sochaux
Julien Masson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Words at Sochaux training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arnaud Nordin 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.
Match15 Sep 2029
1‑3 to Paris Saint-Germain, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout17 Sep 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alexandre Pierre, and the manager let it.
In brief
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The dugout
The view from the dugout
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The dugout
Julien Vetro knocks on the manager’s door
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Looking ahead
A reunion for Pierre Sanchez
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad13 Aug 2029
37 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sochaux lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad13 Aug 2029
A fracture rules Julien Vetro out for 75 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sochaux will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market13 Aug 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Sochaux they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Moustapha Mbow 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.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Words at Sochaux training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arnaud Nordin 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.
Transfer targets13 Aug 2029
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
The dugout13 Aug 2029
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Sochaux, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market13 Aug 2029
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
Market13 Aug 2029
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Jonathan Mexique has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Sochaux.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
The clubs have shaken hands with FC Nantes; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Market25 Jun 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Sochaux people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The dugout25 Jun 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad25 Jun 2029
A falling-out at Sochaux
Arnaud Nordin and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Moustapha Mbow 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.
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Deportivo Cali have kept their man, and Sochaux go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market25 Jun 2029
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Bruno Simon has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market25 Jun 2029
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Robert Ménard 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.
Market25 Jun 2029
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Gabriel Denis is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Jun 2029
A falling-out at Sochaux
Dylan Tavares and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad18 Jun 2029
Arnaud Nordin 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.
Transfer targets18 Jun 2029
Sochaux have made the call to Deportivo Cali. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Transfer targets18 Jun 2029
Brondby have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Market18 Jun 2029
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Chakib Aoudjane has his answer from Sochaux; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Market18 Jun 2029
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sochaux know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout18 Jun 2029
Alexandre Pierre asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
The dugout18 Jun 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Rodriguinho, and the manager let it.
Market18 Jun 2029
1 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Sochaux could get for him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Boardroom28 May 2029
Promotion, confirmed and mathematical, and a town that will not sleep much tonight. Whatever else this season had in it, it ends a division higher than it began.
Match28 May 2029
Sochaux are in among the leaders
Position 2 and 44 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad28 May 2029
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Sochaux had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
The dugout28 May 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad28 May 2029
Rodriguinho arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Rodriguinho has, at Sochaux, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad28 May 2029
A row about effort at Sochaux
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Arnaud Nordin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Boardroom28 May 2029
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Nathaniel Chalobah has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Sochaux have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Squad28 May 2029
The one award nobody else on the pitch can win goes to Alexandre Pierre, on 19 clean sheets across the season. Keepers wait a career for a season like it.
Boardroom28 May 2029
Belts tighten at Sochaux
The accounts are being read more closely than the results. Wages before ambition is the order of business now, and the manager has been told so.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market9 Apr 2029
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Sochaux can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Words exchanged at Sochaux
Moustapha Mbow and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Words at Sochaux training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arnaud Nordin 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.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Sochaux are still strangers to each other
5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Market9 Apr 2029
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Boubacar Fofana’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout9 Apr 2029
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alexandre Pierre trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market19 Feb 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sochaux is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market19 Feb 2029
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Sochaux can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad19 Feb 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sochaux this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Words at Sochaux training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Julien Masson 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.
Squad19 Feb 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Sochaux can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Market19 Feb 2029
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sochaux know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad1 Jan 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 56 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market1 Jan 2029
“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 Sochaux, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad1 Jan 2029
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Sochaux will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Market1 Jan 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sochaux is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad1 Jan 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sochaux this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Jan 2029
Every long career reaches the week the last one is thought about. He would like it to be where he started, and Sochaux know now that the thought has arrived.
The dugout1 Jan 2029
“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.
Market1 Jan 2029
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Sochaux has been clear about where Yanis Benchaouch stands, which is more than many ever get.
Market1 Jan 2029
The name of Boubacar Fofana keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Sochaux say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad30 Oct 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 121 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings30 Oct 2028
Successful dribbles: 30. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
Dylan Albornoz: 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.” Sochaux have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Dylan Tavares 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.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Julien Masson 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.
Match28 Oct 2028
The goals have deserted Sochaux
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Sochaux can tell you which week it ends in.
Match28 Oct 2028
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Match30 Oct 2028
Sochaux at the halfway mark
Half the programme played, position 2, 26 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Antoine Le Gall left the room before anybody could ask which.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match23 Sep 2028
5‑2, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Match20 Sep 2028
Sochaux out of the cup
Paris FC ended it 0‑1. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.34, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market25 Sep 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sochaux is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Words exchanged at Sochaux
Moustapha Mbow and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match23 Sep 2028
7 goals as Sochaux and Dijon go for it
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 7 goals between Sochaux and Dijon, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad25 Sep 2028
A row about effort at Sochaux
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Julien Masson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad25 Sep 2028
50 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Julien Masson was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.38. 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
Upbeat
Market10 Jul 2028
“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 Sochaux, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad10 Jul 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sochaux this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Joshua Frau is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad10 Jul 2028
At 24 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Nacim El Hassani 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.
The dugout10 Jul 2028
Julien Vetro asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
The dugout10 Jul 2028
“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.
Market10 Jul 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Louicius Deedson’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout10 Jul 2028
The manager makes Kapit Djoco a promise
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Sochaux. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market19 Jun 2028
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Sochaux people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market19 Jun 2028
OGC Nice come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Sochaux did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market19 Jun 2028
Only the photograph left for Banfa Diakité
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Banfa Diakité will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sochaux the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad19 Jun 2028
A falling-out at Sochaux
Moustapha Mbow and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Jun 2028
A row about effort at Sochaux
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Julien Masson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets19 Jun 2028
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad19 Jun 2028
At 27 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Market19 Jun 2028
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Boubacar Fofana signs something — a contract at Sochaux or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The terraces19 Jun 2028
The Julien Masson rumours reach the terraces
What was a back-page link has become a chant, and the chant is not friendly. Sochaux would rather it were settled quietly, and it has stopped being quiet.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
The dugout6 Mar 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Sochaux may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match6 Mar 2028
Sochaux refuse to drop out of the race
Position 3, 42 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Words exchanged at Sochaux
Moustapha Mbow and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad6 Mar 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Kapit Djoco and Sochaux agree another 2 years.
Squad6 Mar 2028
A row about effort at Sochaux
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Julien Masson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
The manager makes an example of Kapit Djoco
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
Successful dribbles: 29. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market24 Jan 2028
“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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
A falling-out at Sochaux
Julien Masson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Mathieu Peybernes 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.
Market24 Jan 2028
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Édouard Nguyen has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market24 Jan 2028
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Jacques Gautier has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market24 Jan 2028
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Raymond Gautier 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.
Match22 Jan 2028
A 1‑0 win over Clermont Foot, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad24 Jan 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alexandre Pierre and Sochaux agree another 4 years.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
Successful dribbles: 27. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout8 Nov 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Sochaux may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market8 Nov 2027
Only the photograph left for Franco Daranno
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Franco Daranno will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sochaux the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad8 Nov 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sochaux this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Myron van Brederode 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.
Looking ahead8 Nov 2027
Top-of-the-table clash for Sochaux
FC Metz next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
Squad8 Nov 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ilyas Azizi and Sochaux agree another 4 years.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Ousmane Ba wants out of the dugout
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Sochaux will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
The dugout8 Nov 2027
Somebody else is better right now than Mehdi Jeannin
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.