How did you experience this qualification?
I felt the satisfaction of a job well done and accomplished, because we are at the rendezvous we had set ourselves. The club’s aim was to do as well as, if not better than, the previous year. We had been a semi-finalist last year, so we expected to be a semi-finalist, at least, this year. So yes, the satisfaction of a job well done for the moment, and I am very satisfied with the performance of the team which produced a high quality game, over these three quarter-final matches.
We can say it, your team made short work of Paris, didn’t it?
Just a mouthful, I don’t know if you can say it, because it’s sometimes more complicated than it looks on paper. Above all, she showed a character, a level of play and a regularity, during the three matches, that we had not seen often in the season. There, it happens that we are coming to the end of the season, a priori with all our strength. We have recovered almost all of our players and so it seems that there, now, we find the team at the level we have been waiting for for a while.
Appetite comes with eating: you’re starting to dream of the title, aren’t you?
So, we don’t dream of the coronation… it’s our objective, the coronation ! We know we’re getting there. It is a work of reconstruction and evolution of the club to the top level. We’ve gotten closer to the teams at the top of the table in recent years. And now, it’s been a couple of years where we clearly have the objective of going for the title. We only need that now, because we have developed the club to the top level. But after, you have to fill the prize list, fill the prize list. So we know we’re getting closer, and I hope this year will be the right one. If we have the opportunity to take the title, we will take it, because the players are ambitious, like us. Last year, it didn’t go far. Why not this year?
Growing the club, is that also why you got married with the MHSC?
Absolutely. We have joined the MHSC family and it is going in this direction, that is to say the professionalization and sustainability of the club. We benefit from all the experience accumulated by our football cousins for more than 50 years, now, in the professional world. And so, it helps us a lot, every day on a daily basis, in the evolution of the club and the construction of the club. The volleyball section must reach the same level of professionalism as its football cousins. So, yes, it helps us a lot.
Would you be happy to see Arago de Sète also reach the semi-finals?
Oh yes ! I would be happy if our neighbours, competitors but nevertheless friends from Sète, manage to cross the Narbonne obstacle, which are also our neighbours, but a little further away. Yes, yes, it would be good for the departmental, the Hérault volleyball. Then above all, it would bring vintage posters up to date, from the time when MUC and Arago, when volleyball was not yet professional, shone at the highest level of the French championship. It would make me happy, I hope. They must already manage to defeat Narbonne, this Saturday, to hope to play a good match the following Wednesday. But hey, why not? Anyway, that would make me happy.
Whatever happens, are you proud of the work accomplished in recent years, knowing that Montpellier has regained its place among the big guys?
Yes, I am happy with the work done. The task was not small when we got down to it. We were going quite a long way. But little by little, by being patient and knowing above all where we wanted to go, and what we wanted to do… I’m also lucky to be surrounded by people who are concerned, who are involved in the evolution of the club, and the meeting with the Nicollin family, in particular Olivier and Laurent, was the little extra that will accelerate our development and that motivates us even more, because now, we have the responsibility to shine the colors of the MHSC, across France and across Europe, at the level of volleyball. We are proud of the work accomplished, but we know that there is still a lot ahead of us. That’s why we get up in the morning.
Did you also manage to resist covid, even if you had to make choices?
Yes. But that is indeed my only regret. We were particularly affected by the covid, at a very bad time. By injuries, but especially by the covid, which led us to stop our participation in the European Cup when we were qualified. We had beaten Olympiakos Athens and I made the decision, because we could not agree with Russian teams on the sanitary conditions, in particular the sanitary requirements, to give it up. I think we had the means, there too, to do as well as the previous year, when we were semi-finalists in the European Cup. It is a difficult decision to make. It’s my only regret of the season, not having been able to properly compete for our chances in the European Cup. But it will only be a postponement, since we are already qualified for the European Cup next year. We will therefore return to the European scene next season, with the hope of reaching, why not, the final.