AS Saint-Etienne : How Christophe Galtier became the sexiest French coach on the market | ASSE News

Listening to him, Christophe Galtier is not the man to fall asleep on compliments. “Not the style of the house,” he warned after seeing his team leave Lorient last Sunday. So we hope he doesn’t fall on this piece of paper dripping with love words. The most touching signed Bernard Caïazzo, its former president in Saint-Etienne: “In the world of football, there are twisted, there are bastards but there are also people who prove that it is worth being in this place. This is the case with Christophe. He is truly a reliable and caring person. Fortunately there are people like that in football. “

“He’s somebody who knows how to make you feel good”

Of the kind ? The type to ask for Alain Perrin’s blessing in the Etrat parking lot before agreeing to take over in Sainté. The type to pay the restaurant to a group of Saint-Etienne supporters annoyed by the postponement of a match at the last moment because of the snow. The type, again, to pay his maintenance bonus to the small hands of ASSE at the end of the season. A good guy, then, and an even better trainer. The best of the moment from L1? It’s been a long way since the first deputy steps in Marseille and the blow of the tunnel with Gallardo, a story that could have continued the former midfielder for a lifetime. It would have been unfair, as the hanging does not stick to the image of the friendly boy that we are described with all arms around, able to put presidents, players, their wives and their pets in our pockets. .

“Our first meeting, he showed up 45 minutes late due to a never-ending round of golf,” recalls Julien Jurdie. The AG2R sporting director, based in the area, is a big supporter of the Greens, and he likes to sniff up the coaches of his favorite club. “But as soon as he arrived and we introduced ourselves, it worked out well between us right away. He had a strong desire to discover the world of cycling. We were supposed to spend an hour together, it lasted all afternoon. Someone who knows how to make you feel good. ” Galtier’s warm personality has won over more than one before him. Alain Perrin, who accidentally finds himself renting his house in Marseille while coaching OM, falls in love before the end of the lease. It’s gone for five years of cloudless collaboration, from the Emirates to Saint-Etienne via Sochaux and OL.

Perrin takes a long time to convince him to be number 1

“He had traveled quite a bit as a player and already had a little experience as an assistant,” said the former coach, now a consultant for Téléfoot. Christophe had that friendly and open side that allows him to build a good relationship with the players. It is very good at providing binder. To make a brick wall stand, you need cement, and it was he who cemented the group behind our duo. ” All without ever trying to take in more light than necessary. Galtier took a long time to convince himself that he wanted to be number 1.

Perrin must even play shrink to motivate him: “It was one evening in Sochaux, I must be able to remember the restaurant. I told him that given our age difference, he had to think about becoming number 1. But he was not hot, the management around the field, the relationship with the media, the leaders, the agents. , all this environment could clutter it ”.

The opportunity arrives almost forced, in the fall of 2009. Galtier is not the choice of the heart, hardly the choice by default, but Romeyer and Caïazzo agree on his name lip service. “We had a very bad experience with Laurent Roussey, who was number 2 before taking the team two years earlier,” confirms Caïazzo. For Galtier, we thought we were going to put it on and then see to pick someone up in the winter transfer window. It just goes to show that there are no rules, because we had seven wonderful years with Christophe “. The most beautiful since the Manufrance era. A trophy, the Coupe de la Ligue 2013, which the club expected in 1981, and four successive European qualifiers.

“Federator, that’s a word that suits him”

“A permanent miracle given the budget we had” sums up Loïc Perrin, his former captain, who does not remember a single moment of weariness, except perhaps during the last year, “because he had reached the end of what he could do ”. “There were moments of tension, but since Christophe is an open minded person, listening, we always found a solution. He knows how to renew his sessions, he knows how to manage a group, get the best out of the players he has on hand. He’s a unifier, I think that’s a word that fits him well. “

A small touch of regret escorts the last fires of his Saint-Etienne adventure: this label of defensive coach wrongly attached, and fortunately scattered by his experience in Lille. The loyal deputy Alain Blachon goes up to the front: “In Saint-Etienne, Christophe immediately started with the idea of ​​offering a good game. But I tried to make him understand that when you start in a poorly classified club, we can not count only on the offensive aspect. He wanted a show, when I wanted to see the team reassure themselves little by little with 0-0. In the long run, the supporters criticized us for being small arms but we were not euphoric all the time. He was grieved when there wasn’t complete public support for what he was doing. “

The followers changed their discs while watching the Losc, even if it meant taking shortcuts to hang up the strength of the northern transition game in the best years of Saint-Etienne, with a little extra talent.

The match in Milan, turning in the perception of Galtier?

“Christophe has always had in mind this aspect of rapid transition with us, nuance Loïc Perrin. We worked on that with Aubameyang or with Gradel. In Lille, he has other means to recruit, so you take better players to stick to your game plan “. The other Perrin continues the analysis: “It’s a little simplistic to say that Lille are only a transition team. She has a very clear set-up with and without the ball, a well-established game plan, with players sticking to 150%. The first leg in Milan, in building and managing the game, I found the paw of a great coach. It was the perfect match. “

Like almost everyone we spoke to, Alain Perrin sent a text of congratulations to his former deputy that evening, a sign that the Milanese stroll and Ibrahimovic’s hug made an impression. The return to Pierre Mauroy may endorse the idea of ​​consecration, as if the pieces had finally fitted together for Galtier to be considered as he deserved. “I’m happy to see him at this level,” admits “Puce”, a friend of almost 50, modestly, when he was training little Galtier at Caillols with a certain Eric Cantona.

“Christophe gives a lot, but he took the time to learn when he was an assistant, without skipping steps. He has always been a very endearing type, very open, and curious about everything in order to progress ”. With Alain Perrin, he discovered coaching as a scientific subject, the use of cutting-edge video tools for the time, the details of physical preparation. With Julien Jurdie, he picks up on nutrition, rest, or training courses in a sport where the cursor is pushed to the extreme.

The Ancelotti and Mourinho models

Each meeting with a great trainer, however short, is particularly pampered. “Christophe was super proud to have been co-Oscar winner in 2013 with Carlo Ancelotti because he admires him a lot,” explains Alain Blachon. When we faced PSG at that time, he always wanted to ask them a lot of questions, as after with Mourinho when we played against Manchester United ”. From the Italian, he adopted a certain class of dress, a little ease at playing with the media, and even the rare quality of admitting his mistakes. Randomly ? Jonathan Bamba, whom he did not believe in Sainté, before making him a potential international in Lille.

From the Portuguese he copied a rather remarkable ability to adapt. First able to handle everything in Saint-Etienne down to the color of the wallpaper, then to land on the rear shelf of F1 Lille driven by Lopez and Campos. In view of his last media release, Galtier even managed to erase one of his last flaws, that of being “too nice”, according to Caiazzo. “Every now and then a coach has to show his disagreements as well. And Christophe is a boy who is extremely nice. It’s not someone who goes to conflict. ”

His rant in theTeam
can he question his future in the North? Galtier is in any case quite clear about his desire to limit himself to the field, so as not to end up with a project that swallows up his private life, that the southerner had time to rediscover in Cassis after his seven-year term in the Forez. , between family, golf, and long cycling sessions with Roro Bardet’s jersey. “In Saint-Etienne, he told me several times that it wore him out to have to deal with so much extra-sportsman, concedes Perrin. In Lille, he found something else ”.

At least before Luis Campos packed up. “I’ve been up there a few times and saw how important Campos was to him,” says Jurdie. Recruitment in football is even more complicated than by bike, so if you have to have the agents on the phone ten times a day … “.

“In Saint-Etienne, it wore him to deal with so many extra-sportsmen”

Under contract until 2022, the Lille coach knows he has top ratings in the market. There is the Marseille sea serpent of course, but it is hard to see what Galtier would gain by plunging into this quagmire. Be careful though, warns Blachon: “I often reminded him that no one is a prophet in his country, but I know how much OM really is his club of heart, and if there is a great opportunity to do so. go, he will not listen to anyone, only his heart will speak ”.

As he almost spoke in December 2017, when he offered to help Romeyer and Caiazzo: “If we have to come back to save the club, I’m coming.” It is also rumored that his Saint-Etienne past would not put off Jean-Michel Aulas, who went directly through him to feel the pulse of his group during the year of the double, in 2008. But is the Lyon project today more kiffant that the Lille project?

Above all, the person concerned seems to be dreaming of something else. “I have a personal goal, a place where I would like to be the coach one day, but I won’t tell you.” It’s an open secret, however, that Galtier dreams of Liverpool, the club he chose for his week of study abroad when he graduated as a coach. A hair too high for the moment? Loïc Perrin invites his former coach to give himself more time in Lille. “His coaching career is smart, he doesn’t cut corners, now I don’t know if he has enough fame abroad to take on an important club. On the other hand, if he continues like this for another season or two with Lille, why not “.

Alain Perrin, on the other hand, understands that Galtier has already had two or three calls from Italy, and that a big Serie A club would not leave him indifferent. Then he takes the time to call us back the next day to talk about a softer track: “If Deschamps goes, I think he’s a serious candidate for the France team after the 2022 World Cup”.

The English temptation rather than Lyon or Marseille

Caïazzo does not say no: “Christophe is a boy who gets better every year and who will continue to improve. He has become a renowned coach and I don’t know where he will stop. ” A certainty all the same. When it comes to choosing, the opinion of Régine, his wife, will count more than all the others put together. Christophe Galtier did not hesitate to cut ties with Jean-Pierre Bernès after an inappropriate reflection from his former agent in his presence. “His wife always tells me ‘Of course for you, it’s the good god”, smiles “Puce”. On the other hand, she advises him a lot and knows how to bring him back down to earth when she thinks he is igniting a bit. This is its rock “. And the only one not to give him compliments, obviously. It takes one.