Marked for Axel Witsel
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad9 Nov 2026
There were 11 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Moïse Bombito breaks a bone — 121 days out
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.
Match7 Nov 2026
Beaten 0‑8 by Paris Saint-Germain, and beaten everywhere it matters. The inquest starts on the training pitch on Monday morning.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Mohamed Amoura 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.
Match7 Nov 2026
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between OGC Nice and Paris Saint-Germain, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at OGC Nice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tiago Gouveia 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 dugout9 Nov 2026
Axel Witsel 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.
Boardroom9 Nov 2026
Nobody left the OGC Nice dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
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 0‑8 Jean-Luc Lemoine left the room before anybody could ask which.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad26 Oct 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” OGC Nice may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Marked 8.19 at 19, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Squad26 Oct 2026
A row about effort at OGC Nice
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohamed Amoura was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad26 Oct 2026
A falling-out at OGC Nice
Morgan Sanson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Yehvann Diouf
“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.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Jean-Luc Lemoine to a room that had heard them before.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match3 Oct 2026
A derby to forget for OGC Nice
Beaten 0‑1 by Monaco in the one fixture where losing is not allowed. The football was bad enough; the week ahead will be worse.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 34. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Martin Ponsot is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 17 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A row about effort at OGC Nice
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohamed Amoura was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A falling-out at OGC Nice
Axel Witsel and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
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 0‑1 Jean-Luc Lemoine left the room before anybody could ask which.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
No hiding place for Dante
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Dante, and the manager let it.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Shots: 5. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Sep 2026
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Yehvann Diouf: 2 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Match16 Sep 2026
The small margins put OGC Nice out
Out, 1‑1 to Chamois Niortais, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
Match19 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for OGC Nice
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around OGC Nice are no longer polite ones.
Squad21 Sep 2026
A falling-out at OGC Nice
Sofiane Diop and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Bartosz Żelazowski is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Yehvann Diouf
“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.
Match19 Sep 2026
LOSC Lille left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Match16 Sep 2026
OGC Nice rescue it on 116 minutes
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 116. Chamois Niortais had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
The kick that got away from Axel Witsel
Twelve yards, a goalkeeper guessing, and it still did not go in. He will take the next one, and every soul in the ground will hold their breath.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market14 Sep 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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at OGC Nice training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Amoura 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 ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Axel Witsel
“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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
OGC Nice are still strangers to each other
7 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.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Market14 Sep 2026
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Yehvann Diouf’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. KV Oostende have kept their man, and OGC Nice go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
$15.2M was the most the club would pay and Al-Nassr were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Market10 Aug 2026
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” AVS had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Market10 Aug 2026
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Yehvann Diouf and OGC Nice agree another 5 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
A falling-out at OGC Nice
Mohamed Amoura and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Market10 Aug 2026
The name of Mohamed Abdelmonem has come up in conversations OGC Nice were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and OGC Nice know it.
Squad10 Aug 2026
No place for Léo Bonatini in the new shape
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation OGC Nice are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
OGC Nice asked and Tottenham said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
$11.2M on the table at Al-Nassr. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Market3 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what OGC Nice can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
10 seasons of Dante
595 appearances across 10 seasons in these colours. Careers like that are not built any more, and OGC Nice know what they have.
Market3 Aug 2026
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Sofiane Diop commits to OGC Nice for another 4 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Sofiane Diop 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Axel Witsel retires from international football
“140 caps. I have loved every one, and it is somebody else’s turn.” At 37 he has stepped away from his country and is going nowhere at OGC Nice.