Ghislain Printant : "Much courage and discipline"

What do you take away from this match? Suffering or success?

I take everything away. We don’t like to suffer, but we voluntarily gave them the ball. Many teams like to counterattack us and I was tired of suffering these counterattacks and paying for it every time. The number one objective when you want a positive outcome is to not let in a single goal. We worked on a system with two lines of four and two players to counter. Nîmes certainly gave us a run for our money but it’s extremely difficult to impose yourself there. Victory can make players understand that they form a quality team.

What was the turning point of the match?

We suffered, we had the success that escaped us since the beginning of the season. The facts of the game and the VAR were never favourable for us. Today, a ball went to die on the pole and this play was one of the key moments of the match. A sign! This isn’t ASSE’s most successful match, but we won it. Of course, it isn’t Football that I appreciate the most, but the players were mentally present and were tactically disciplined and were rewarded by Mathieu Debuchy’s goal. Our team was very unwell, today it behaved like a team that just need to earn points. No matter the manner, we needed to leave with points. Many will say these are three happy points but for me they’re three points obtained with much courage and discipline.

Will this success return confidence to your players?

I do not know. This isn’t an easy situation to bear for anyone. I had one-on-one talks with my players. I reminded them of their responsibilities. The majority of them that began the match this afternoon had participated in the beginning of this catastrophic season. We need to reverse this downward spiral. I gave my players a big tip of the hat. This club is mythical. Today, it has 8 points after 8 matches. It’s insufficient especially when we see the quality of the team. For the moment, I’m savouring the victory. Today, I didn’t prepare for this match by trying to save my own skin, I did it so that ASSE would earn three points. I never put my personal interests before those of the club. I never expressed my personal situation in the conversations. The best response, is the one I just had today on the field.