I won’t bore you with a long report on the Le Havre match, but I watched it this morning and, in general, was pretty impressed. Nice dominated the first half, thanks in part to a massive performance by Faé, and Modeste played the best 45 minutes I’ve ever seen out of him — he was trying all sorts of things he usually won’t even consider, and most of them were coming off, including a Zlatan-esque backheeled pass for Faé that he took out of the air and played perfectly into space. I’ve said it before and it doesn’t take a genius to recognize it, but confidence is everything to Modeste, and if he can just keep his head right, he’ll be a force to be reckoned with. (Hopefully the fact that Antonetti has decided not to send him out on loan will help with that, rather than seem him doomed to a second half spent sitting at the end of the bench, watching Adeilson play.)

Faé faded a lot in the second half, and it’s no coincidence that Nice’s hold on the match did, too — in the 4-3-3, it seems like they really need him to dominate the midfield (which is asking a lot), because if he doesn’t, those middle three end up doing nothing but chasing the ball. Luckily, Hellebuyck is a machine, and Le Havre’s passing in the final third was dreadful, as was most of their shooting, so the ease with which they broke through the midfield on the counter came to nothing.

In addition to Modeste and Faé (for a half), Diakité also had a strong match — it’s rare for him to stand out as much as he did on Tuesday, and it was really nice to see. He got forward well, and made a crucial, sliding intervention in the second half, when a Le Havre player (can’t remember who, sorry) was in alone on goal. In goal, Letizi didn’t have much to do, apart from catch the periodic hopeful cross and watch balls fly over his head, but he earn his pay in the 89th minute with a flying save off a free kick. The old man has still got skills to go with his class — Nice really are lucky to have him.

Also, Kanté is a beast, but we knew that already. It would be awful to lose him, particularly with more teams circling Apam every day.

* * *

In scheduling news:

•The draw for the semis was held today, and Nice get to play at home again. Woo hoo! Vannes will come calling February 3rd or 4th.

•The Nancy match has been rescheduled for February 17th, after the trip to Le Mans.

There’s allegedly football being played in the first part of this clip. I have my doubts.

Arras 1 – 3 Nice
Buts: Bellatrêche (52è) pour Arras; Ben Saada (48è), Modeste (110è), Bamogo (113è pen) pour Nice

Arras: Lambenne – De Barros, Daval, Lombard, Delépine – Bellatrêche (c), Duchateau (Diarra, 99è), Luyssen (Lamourette, 109è), Hadjal – Catelet (Bellaredj, 63è), Robail

Nice: Letizi – Apam, Hognon, Cid, Rool (c; Gace, 115è) – Jeunechamp, Traoré (Hellebuyck, 71è), Ben Saada – Quansah (Bamogo, 58è), Modeste, Mouloungui

* * *

I was going to wait to write up the Arras match until I’d watched it, but since the official site seems to have decided there’s no point in uploading something no one can see, it looks like I’m not actually going to be able to do that.

So, to sum up what everyone probably already knows, conditions where shocking (frozen pitch, crazy thick fog), so much so that that referee briefly stopped the match, and only allowed it go to on after Antonetti and Captain Cyril #1 — who was apparently just immense for the 115 minutes he was on the pitch — unleashed their legendary powers of persuasion on him. It was literally almost impossible to see what was going on throughout most of the 90 minutes, but both teams scored (so we’re told, anyway), and it wasn’t until the fog lifted in added time that Nice were able to really assert their superiority, in the form of two more goals, and secure a place in the next round.

A next round in which they will play — wait for it — Monaco. Sweet. The match will be played away, at the end of this month.

ETA: Ok, the match has been uploaded now. If I find some patience, I’ll watch it and write a more detailed response tomorrow.

* * *

In other news, you may have heard Nice have quietly snapped up a new striker. His name is Pereira de Mello Adeilson (that’s just Adeilson to us, because he’s merciful like that), he’s 23, cost €1 million from Brazilian club Ipatinga and, if you believe the French press, the club beat out at least Bayer Leverkusen for his signature; they’ve secured his services for three-and-a-half years.

According to Roger Ricort, Adeilson wasn’t even his target when he went to Brazil to scout, but he played so well that Nice turned their attention to him and totally forgot about the nameless opponent they had traveled to see. As you’d expect, there’s a lot of optimism about the guy in the Nice camp, from his size and ability — there’s a pretty sweet goal here — to his personality, and the way he carries himself (Ricort compared him to Ederson, which is high praise indeed), but obviously he’s got everything to prove.

Right now, by Adeilson’s own admission, he’s behind on fitness because he’s coming off a three-week vacation, so it’ll probably be a while before we get to see him in action.

Conditions were so bad that the match was postponed yesterday, and then put off again today. For what it’s worth, here’s the lineup that would have taken the field — for the second match in a row, Rémy was in the squad but didn’t even made the bench. By next weekend, one hopes, he’ll at least be a sub, sitting next to his buddy Ospina, whose third L1 start will have to wait.

There’s no word yet on when the match will be played, but it’d be nice (ha ha) to get it done before Christmas, so everyone goes into the break on equal terms.

The team are back in wet training on Monday.

Who does he think he is, Gerd Müller?

ASSE 0-1 Nice
But: Echouafni (20è) pour Nice

St Etienne: Janot – Andreu, Benalouane, Varrault, Sauget – Machado, Hautcoeur, Dernis (Payet, 73è) – Ilan (c), Gomis (Gigliotti, 82è), Mirallas (Matsui, 64è)

Nice: Letizi – Diakité, Apam, Kanté, Rool – Echouafni (c), Coulibaly (Jeunechamp, 73è), Faé, Hellebuyck – Bamogo (Modeste, 58è), Mouloungui (Cid, 94è)

* * *

There’s not really much to say about this match, apart from that it was just the sort of ugly win that makes you really proud of a team. The three points won were nothing to do with ability, and everything to do with desire, organization, and fight; points that have to be gutted out if Nice are dreaming of an extend stay within shouting distance of where they are in the table right now.

Conditions were dreadful and, for essentially the whole match, it was 10 men behind the ball and a whole lot of running from everyone in red and black. Ugly or not, it was awesome to see how hard everyone worked — Bamogo did nothing but defend for long stretches, and Hellebuyck, who must be the fittest man in the world, was all over the pitch, particularly late when legs were going and no one else could get forward. He was immense.

Really, it’s hard to think of much to add to Anonetti’s postmatch comments, particularly the bit where he said “I [take my] hat off to our defense that was heroic.” Damn right. This team have given up one goal (against five scored) in their last four league matches and, apart from some lapses against Lorient, the defense — including Letizi, who doesn’t get many style points, but is there when he needs to be — has looked nearly impenetrable. I don’t care who you’re playing, those are impressive numbers. After a preseason spent leaking goals, I don’t think anyone would have guessed a Lloris-free Nice would be defending this convincingly, even by late November.

* * *

I also don’t think anyone actually believes Nice will stay this close to the top of the table for long, but it’s fair to say that, in the last seven matches — starting with Bordeaux and including Créteil — the team have really shown us something. Apart from periodic, inspired stretches, the football isn’t petty, but they’re smart, they’re hard to play against, and they believe in themselves. Those three things, even without Rémy, and without the still-missing killer instinct, have made Nice a force to be reckoned with and, most importantly, a team that can tough out wins, even when they’re not playing well. If they can keep their wits about them moving forward (and adjust successfully when Rémy comes back), they’re going to make this interesting.

And, finally, while digging through ASSE forums yesterday, in amidst the “OMG NICE PLAY ANTIFOOTBALL!11!!!” rants and debates on whether they should moon over how much they want Antontetti back or just move on, I found this post, which I thought was a pretty perceptive summary of where Nice stand and how they play (forgive the Google translate garbling, I think you can still get the gist):

Nice still lost 4 best players in the offseason (Balmont, Kone, Lloris, Ederson) does not have a staff of Cador championship (an attack Mouloungui-Bamogo-Modeste, we saw more impressive) and was moving last night without his main striker (Remy). One can therefore understand that this team has not proposed football-champagne, outside what is more, and also in a relegation (kind of wounded beast that must be wary because it is always susceptible to rebel) .

Nice done with its resources and for now that they succeeded fairly well. They seek to maintain them as soon as possible and once the first goal achieved, they will seek the highest possible. They are not flamboyant in the game (how many teams are in France?), They know very well that they will be very difficult to maintain their current pace of 38 days but offset by a state of mind of combatants and not drop anything. And the points made are no longer taken.

Finally, Antonetti yells perhaps on the edge of the button, but he is at the root of this desire that we see on the ground and that made her a commando team on which many training just break your teeth (when they appear above Nice on paper). If Etienne had half the commitment and willingness shown by the people of Nice on the first 15 games, it would not be the 20th this morning.

(I’m generally a pretty cynical, irritable football fan, but having Nice described that way by an opposing supporter made me feel almost embarrassingly proud.)

Buts: Bamogo (20è), Mouloungui (80è) pour Nice ; N’Daw (8è) pour Nantes

Nice: Letizi – Diakité (Jeunechamp 83è), Apam, Kanté, Rool – Echouafni (c), Faé, Hellebuyck – Bamogo (Coulibaly, 86è), Modeste (Ben Saada, 73è), Mouloungui

Nantes: Alonzo – Pierre, Moullec, Mareval, Gravgaard – N’Daw, Capoue (Keseru, 83è), Da Rocha (c ; Djordjevic, 88è), Faty – Bagayoko, Bekamenga (Dossevi, 78è)

* * *

First and most importantly: This win means seven L1 matches in a row without a loss, four wins in a row in all competitions, and not a single dropped point since Rémy got hurt. Hell, yes.

Though Nice are still struggling to put games away when they have the chance, that was still ten times better than than the Lorient match. The speed of play was quicker, the attack was much more fluid and, for about 15 minutes after Bamogo’s goal, Nice played some really, really good football. And during those 15 minutes, it was obvious why Quansah has been so blown away by the supporters because they were magnificent, and the team were undeniably lifted by them.

Unlike against Lorient, where the defense were the standouts, on Sunday the attackers and the midfielders were the ones who really shone. While the midfield didn’t necessarily stand out as individuals, as a group they made it hard for Nantes to possess the ball in the middle of the park, and also did a nice job of exploiting the space behind their defense by playing long, diagonal balls out to Mouloungui and Bamogo.

I think Bamogo reads this blog and heard me bitching, because he was totally transformed — playing off Modeste, he was dropping deep to pick the ball up and either playing one-touch or, even better, keeping it with his back to goal, and then laying it off before getting forward himself. No more of this “receive the ball and attack the defender, no matter what” stuff. (The vast improvement didn’t stop Antonetti from yelling his name every 30 seconds, of course. That, alone, is making me want to learn French, just so I’ll know what the hell he’s got to tell Habib that’s so important. And it’s always different! The instructions must be very detailed.) Additionally, his goal, though I’m not sure why it stood — Chouf looked to be miles offside when the ball was played, and he was very much involved with the pay — was well-taken. And with his head, no less!

Also impressive up front was Mouloungui who, at times, was very good. He was much freer than he was against Créteil, exchanging with Bamogo and getting into the middle sometimes, rather than just driving over and over again toward the touchline on the left. As for his goal, well, we’ve been over that. There were a lot of questions about Mouloungui’s attitude and toughness before he arrived, but in the past few weeks with Rémy down, I think he’s proved himself beyond a doubt to Nice supporters. Good on ya, Eric.

While his fellow attackers were impressing everyone, meanwhile, poor Anthony Modeste was mostly awful. Apart from a few good moments of digging, when he dropped in to do some dirty work in the midfield, he mostly spent his day demolishing his own confidence by a)squandering chances, b)making awful decisions, and c)giving the ball away. And, sometimes, all three at once. You have to feel bad for the kid — he’s still only 20 years old, and does nothing but work, work, work. He’s just thinking too much right now, so nothing is working, and he’s getting whistled off by his own supporters. (How, Nice fans, does that help things? For god’s sake, he feels shitty enough as it is.) There’s no reason to give up on him yet but, with Rémy apparently coming back this weekend, Mouloungui and Bamogo playing well, and Ben Saada chomping at the bit for space in the team, I don’t know how much of Modeste we’re going to be seeing in the near the future.

At the back, Apam and Kanté both made alarming, careless mistakes, and oldboy Mamadou Bagayoko (who was gracious and hilarious and looking amazing in his postgame interview) was giving them both a surprising amount of trouble. To me it actually looked like a lack of concentration more than anything else — it was as if they got so caught up the team-wide confidence that they drifted mentally and almost paid for it. Luckily, Letizi was sharp, and their teammates were around to clean up the minor messes, but that really needs to stop happening if this whole top-four thing is going to continue.

Additionally, I feel the need to mention that Cyril #1 is playing so well right now that it’s completely ridiculous — I don’t think he’s put a foot wrong in about a month. Also, he and Hellebuyck are playing off one another like they can each others’ minds. Long may it continue. Like, for three or four more years. Please.

I managed to find the Créteil match and, while I’ll spare you a full report (I can hear the sighs of relief from here), I’ve still got some reactions to offer on a handful of newbies/youngsters/Habibs.

•Ospina reads the game really well — he’s almost never surprised by what the attacker does with the ball and, in what is probably a chicken-egg situation, is almost preternaturally calm in goal, which can’t help but make it easier to adjust to him as a keeper. He’s also good in the air, and gets off his line very well. The accuracy of his punts could use some work, but the only real mistake I remember him making (and he was admittedly not real busy against Créteil) was spilling a shot for a corner.

•Ben Saada is a pleasure to watch. He’s inconsistent still and can get knocked off the ball, but he’s much stronger and tougher than his size would suggest, and he’s always got his head up, trying to create something. The best thing about him, though, is that he knows when to play simple — you can periodically see him noticing a hint of space for a through ball, but then reining himself in because the odds aren’t quite good enough to try it. His brain is just constantly going; when things slow down around him, he’s like a little kid which too much energy, almost twitching with the desperation to get moving again. Ahem. Yeah, I like him. He needs to play more and improve his constancy, but I like him. A lot.

•Bamogo must be infuriating to play with (and also, if the number of times/match that Antonetti screams his name is anything to go by, coach) sometimes. To be fair, his finish against Créteil was lovely — a little chip over the on-rushing keeper, cool as you like. But his decision making with the ball at his feet is either achingly slow, or too-frequently limited to a choice between “take on the defender” or “take on the defender.” (I’m guessing it’s a bit of both.) Given his success rate in beating defenders (even Championnat defenders) with the ball at his feet, passing really should be a more prominent option, particularly when he’s playing with guys like Ben Saada and Mouloungui, with whom playing a one-two is the most obvious thing on earth.

•Based (foolishly, I realize) on his six-plus minutes against Créteil, Quansah’s brain works like Bamogo’s should. He’s bubbling with pace and ability, but what was most impressive in those few minutes was his intelligence — he took people on when he was in a position to beat them, but otherwise played simple, and tried to create for other people. That kid has potential to be really, really good.

•The ferocity with which Mouloungui fights to get the ball back when he loses it is amazing — if Bamogo did that, he’d instantly be twice as useful. It would be awesome, though, if Mouloungui would do something other than just drive to the endline when he gets the ball out wide on the left. I get that he’s really, really left-footed, and that he can often either get a cross in or win a corner, but cutting inside every once in a while would make things a lot harder on defenders, and even if he can’t get a shot off, a few times a game he’ll have a chance to thread the ball through to Modeste, or Rémy or Bamogo.

* * *

Looking ahead to Nantes, despite his assurances earlier this week that he’d be ready to go on Sunday, Rémy is actually only 50-50 to play right now, pending further tests today. Traore is out for sure, but Cyril #2 should back, and Coulibaly is training again, so he could make the squad, as well. In other good news for Nice, Ivan Klasnic will miss Sunday’s match through suspension — it’s always nice not to have to face him.

And, even further ahead, Ospina’s been recalled to the Colombian national team — he’s one of only two keepers (the other is the current first-choice) in a very, very young team that’s been called up for Wednesday’s friendly against Nigeria. As usual, I’m having a terrible time finding information about their call-ups, but there’s a good chance he could be facing Apam, should they both make appearances.

Also, in matches not going to be played in Colombia, Ben Saada’s in the Tunisia side for their upcoming friendly against Ghana.

Report the First

Alright, so, the Lorient game. Ugh. Fantastic to play like that and get three points, but still — ugh. The goal was a stroke of luck, a failed clearance that ended up at Chouf’s feet with the keeper down, and which he rolled in to the near corner of the net as he was falling down. In reality, Nice rarely looked threatening (and seemed to be in more of a 4-5-1 than the 4-4-2 it looked on paper, so deep was Bamogo playing), and the few chances they created were squandered badly by Mouloungui. If this is life without Rémy, I don’t want to think about what will happen if he ever picks up a long-term injury. (Happily, he said on 100% Aiglons this week that he’ll be back for Sunday, so hopefully we can stick our heads in the sand about the possible striking problems a bit longer.)

In addition to the lack of threats going forward, I lost count of the giveaways even before half time — the match was just sloppy, and was played with a strange lack of urgency. Probably because of the slow pace things seemed to perk up a bit when Modeste went on late in the match — he may be artless, but he’s fast and wants to prove himself, so he doesn’t give up on anything and was involved with Nice’s most threatening moves of the second half.

In good news, though, the defense as a group were awfully good. Apam, in particular, was head and shoulders above everyone around him — every time there was a sloppy giveaway and Lorient were putting together an attack, he was there to clean up the mess, be it with a perfectly timed tackle or a smart interception. He really looked like a man among boys at times, it was a truly impressive performance. Cyril #1, also, was impressive, apart from the few times he caught the sloppy disease. He won everything that came his way in the air, and his distribution, for the most part, was quite good. (And that’s not just my biased heart talking — he made L’Equipe’s team of the week and everything.)

Additionally, Letizi was solid. He didn’t have much to do, but made a massive save early with his leg when he’d already committed in the other direction — it was the sort of save that looks lucky but, when you see the replay, is absolutely intentional, and just good goal keeping. Yeah, the old man’s still got.

* * *

Report the Second (such as it is)

I’ve not seen yesterday’s match and probably won’t be able to find it, so I can only rely on cheerful forum posts that indicate the 3-0 victory was deserved and well-played. So woo hoo! And well done to the team for not taking Créteil lightly.

Ben Saada scored his first goal for Nice (from the penalty spot) and reportedly had a really good match, Bamogo was threatening, Ospina made a couple big saves, Modeste scored, and Quansah played in his first professional match. Were it not for the injury suffered by Cyril #2 (coming right after he played a solid game against Lorient), there’d be nothing but smiles at Nice HQ this morning.

So Nice move on to the last eight, and will face Le Havre in the new year; the draw to determine the host will be held next week.

After the first 30 minutes or so of Saturday’s match, you’d never, ever have been able to convince me that Nice would get a point. Not a million years. As everyone who gave voice to the obvious after the match (Antonetti and Cyril #1 among them) said, they gave Bordeaux waaaaay too much respect, and almost paid for it with a home loss. Happily, though, Nice managed to realize they weren’t playing Barca and gradually woke up — I was watching on a dreadful stream, but even I could tell they put together some nice passing moves in the first half, and were nowhere near as inferior as they’d appeared early-on in the match.

The best part of the whole match for me was injury time. It wasn’t even a little bit pretty, and was highlighted (lowlighted?) by a profound lack of organization, a couple bad decisions, and a near-disaster from Ospina when he took a bad touch and gave the ball away to Gourcuff, but Nice were fighting like crazy, and you could see that, to a man, they believed they could get that second goal back. I don’t know if it was the fantastic support, or the massive stroke of luck in Mouloungui’s offside goal being allowed to stand, or what, but the belief was really, really great to see.

And, while the PK was wrongly given (ala that Lyon PK you may recall), Mouloungui was clever in looking for it when he played the ball into the defender’s body — I’m a huge Ben Saada supporter, but Mouloungui changed the game when he came on, just by being in the right place(s) at the right time(s).*

As Rool (who was old-man awesome) said after the match, it’s hard not to think of this result as balancing out what happened against Lyon. More importantly, though, it shown the team that they really can come back against almost anything. Getting a point after being down 0-2 with five minutes left probably won’t happen again for a long time, but the self-believe from Saturday will hopefully be around for a long while.

Now if they could just STOP GIVING UP PKs, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, we might be in pretty good shape.

Also, regarding the baby keeper: He looked bad on the first goal (I still can’t figure out why it took him so long to get across, he had to have been unsighted) and with that hairy touch in extra time, but other than that he was impressive. Made a crazy, reaction save with his legs shortly after the first goal, and got off his line really well when he needed to, in order to close down a couple breaks. Ospina’s pair of encouraging performances aside, though, Football365 reported Saturday that Letizi will be back in goal on Wednesday, where he’ll stay until the winter break. We’ll see if that actually holds true or not.

And, finally, Apam’s extension has been confirmed by people who aren’t his agent. At best, it means he’s getting paid better and will be around forever. More realistically, it means he’s getting paid better, and has graciously put Nice in a position to get more for him when the inevitable sale comes.

*It’s worth pointing out the class with which Blanc has taken those two poor refereeing decisions at the end of the match. As Antonetti could tell him, that’s not easy to do when you’re in the right — full credit to Blanc.

I thought I was over the Lyon match, but I just watched the Inside documentary at ogcnice.tv and am once again deeply depressed, albeit what I suspect is a very girly way — the rage is gone, and now I’m just really, really sad for all of them, especially poor Letizi. What a nightmarish thing to stomach, especially when you’re totally impotent to right such an obvious wrong — one that, to make matters worse, has been officially acknowledged. Jesus.

There’s a well-established history of referee corruption in Italy but now, generally, where awful calls are made in favor of the big clubs, it’s credited to a “psychosis” whereby, summarized very simplistically, officials bow to an internalized belief that the big clubs are probably better anyway, and deserve the benefit of the doubt. I’m assuming a variation on that is what happened on Saturday, but I gotta say it doesn’t make it any easier to take, particularly with all of France — press and otherwise — seemingly believing Lyon are routinely favorite by officials. (Take out “Lyon” and replace it with either “Inter” or “Juve,” and you’ve got the subject of at least a dozen articles published each Serie A season.)

And Aulas‘ self-righteous objection to L’Equipe’s description of the match as “stolen” would be hilarious if it wasn’t so offensive. When that sort of things happens to your advantage, you keep your mouth shut and your head down, and just be thankful, particularly when your player essentially admitted to diving for the free kick that was the first goal.

Antonetti raised the issue of replays, which is getting some play — including in the national assembly — because of the multiple acknowledged errors last weekend, but one imagines that, like it always does, the talk will die down once there are a few fairly clean rounds. He and Cohen both said after the match that it’s getting hard to believe in the game anymore, but the reality of life is that shit happens. It’s just a pity that, in football, seems to happen to the small clubs more often.

*deep breath*

Ok, I’m done. Not talking about it anymore. Really. Moving on.

I’m traveling and working and won’t be able to get a report up until Tuesday (which is probably just as well, since if I wrote it now, you’d get a long piece comparing Italian and French referees, mixed with a lot of mooning over Cyril #1 and being sent off on principle), but until then there’s this, which hurts a lot but is worth watching to see Cohen melting down, and Letizi being epic class at the end.*

Or, if you prefer your video with less football and more disgust, you’ll find Rool here, doing everyone’s heart a bit of good.

*I say that based entirely on Letizi’s expressions and body language, since I can’t understand a damn word he says. If he’s swearing a blue streak and threatening violence, do let me know.