With the maintenance of the Girondins in Ligue 2, the Villefranche Beaujolais club will be prevented from moving up and will have to remain in the lower category. A drama for its president Philippe Terrier who expresses all his bitterness, Wednesday July 27 on franceinfo.
Philippe Terrier: Do you have the feeling of being the turkey of the farce in this story?
franceinfo: Yes completely. I would like to stop arguing about this case, but I think the dice were rigged. We wanted to try to fight, we would have been the Don Quixote of French football but we are facing a new Luzenac case [petit club qui avait obtenu sa montée sportivement, mais qui avait été empêché d’accéder à l’étage supérieur pour des questions administratives en 2014].
“You don’t have the right to be small when you face a club like Bordeaux. It’s like that, you have to put your fist in your pocket and let it pass.”
Philippe Terrier, president of Villefranche Beaujolaisat franceinfo
Do you have the feeling that French football did not want to see a historic club disappear?
I think the DNCG is doing its job well: the file presented by the Girondins did not hold water, but they found friends who found them 40 million euros, I only ask to believe it. Me, I don’t have friends who give gifts of 40 million euros. Politicians got involved, the influence was strong, I was quickly told that it was impossible to fight against it.
Taking this decision three days before the start of the season, does it taste bitter to you?
For a small club like Villefranche, it’s catastrophic. But we’re not going to spend our summer crying over our fate. The decision should have been taken before July 15 and as it was Bordeaux, it was taken much later. How is it possible ? Go ask the people of Sètes how it is possible: a club which was in the same situation as Bordeaux which we did not ask if they wanted to appeal or not, we demoted them directly.
“When we’re called Bordeaux, we don’t have the same rules.”
Philippe Terrier, president of Villefranche Beaujolaisat franceinfo
Is it complicated at the club today, for the players, for the supporters?
Let’s stop talking about it. We drop it, it’s France today. There are rules for some and rules for others. We’re kids, we keep our mouths shut and we work, that’s all. There is nothing else to do. We talk about the jobs in Bordeaux that had to be saved: going from a budget of a hundred and a few million to a budget of 40 million, I think that there are a lot of poor people who will be made redundant. I hope that the town hall of Bordeaux, which applauds the project with both hands, will be able to hire them and reuse them in the municipality. I think that would be the least of it.