This Saturday, May 7, the defeat against Nantes in the French Cup final was a terrible disappointment for the supporters and the entire Azurian club. The impact is such that the future of several pillars of OGC Nice is now in question.
Has the season for the Gym completely derailed? In the span of two months, OGC Nice has gone from being on the championship podium and potential French Cup winner to struggling for a spot in European competitions and ending up as a sad finalist.
Beyond the results, it’s also the level of play provided by the Azurian team that has significantly regressed. Although there have been very few matches where OGC Nice has truly shined offensively, we now see impressive difficulties in scoring goals over many matches, and it’s almost solely up to individual performances for the Gym to find the net. Amine Gouiri has not contributed decisively for over 13 matches, and Kasper Dolberg no longer seems willing to make the necessary efforts to contribute to the team. A departure for the Dane already seemed likely, but now it is inevitable.
In response to this “crisis,” the Nice board is already considering solutions to enact changes that could reverse the trend. And a departure seems to be on the horizon within the Azurian club, potentially involving coach Christophe Galtier or Julien Fournier, the sporting director.
It was Nice Matin that unveiled the tensions within the club since this winter and the January transfer window. Indeed, the Azurian coach was very dissatisfied with the management of the last transfer window. Galtier had a very specific request: an experienced winger. He had asked for Steven Bergwijn from Tottenham, an accessible target as the Dutchman played little for the London club, but Fournier chose a completely different profile, Bilal Brahimi. Although the SCO d’Angers player showed promising performances in the first half of the season, he had absolutely no experience.
Galtier and his assistant Oleksiak reportedly took this transfer decision very poorly: “We claim to compete for the Champions League, but we strengthen with a substitute from Angers.” The tensions are such that the coach, who was the Ligue 1 champion last year, is questioning his Nice journey. To him, he has been misled about the club’s assets, and believes it still has a lot of structural progress to make to be on par with Olympique clubs (Marseille and Lyon) and PSG.
Within the club, Nice Matin mentions two distinct camps. Those who consider the current squad already very qualitative and sufficient for competing in Europe and the podium. On the other side, the Galtier camp believes that the team has reached its maximum level and cannot progress further due to numerous shortcomings. It’s president Rivère who played the intermediary between these two camps, without clearly siding with either.
It remains to be seen how the club, president Rivère, and owner INEOS will manage to steer the ship. Coach Galtier has reportedly requested a meeting with Jim Ratcliffe to discuss the shortcomings that led to this unfortunate season’s end. The arrival of a new sporting director could potentially resolve the relationship issues between Fournier and Galtier. Luis Campos, one of the best sporting directors in the football world, a key component of Galtier’s success at Lille and familiar with the Côte d’Azur (having been with Monaco from 2013-2016), could replace Fournier as the Gym’s sporting director. A few days ago, the Portuguese gave an interview to Nice Matin.
“Nice, I really like it, great club, beautiful city, beautiful stadium, beautiful training center, an owner with an international dimension. There’s everything. The club keeps progressing, moving in the right direction.”
