The Nantes coach spoke about his future on the FC Nantes bench before the 32nd final of the Coupe de France against the N3 club Drancy on Saturday.
Nantes coach Antoine Kombouaré, in the hot seat for several weeks, assured Thursday that he was not disturbed by the speculation and had “anything else to give a damn about but to think about” his future, before his team enters the Coupe de France. “I haven’t asked myself this kind of question for a long time, otherwise I only think about that and ultimately, I don’t think about working. I have other things to care about than thinking about what I’m going to become.”hit the coach, who has been threatened for a month and still weakened by the rout of his team in Brest (4-1) on Sunday.
“Today, I am here, under contract, and happy to be here. I am aware that what we are doing does not live up to expectations, mine. We are capable of doing much better”added Kanak, 61, before the duel against Drancy (N3) on Saturday in the 32nd final of the Coupe de France.
After the 15th day of Ligue 1, FC Nantes is in 14th place in the standings, just one point ahead of the relegation zone. For the moment, what seems above all to save Kombouaré’s place is the difficulty of the club’s management in finding a replacement for him.
Conceiçao says no, Beye on pole?
The Franco-Polish businessman Waldemar Kita, president of the club, dreamed of bringing back the Portuguese Sergio Conceiçao but the former FC Porto coach finally refused the position according to the press, after two weeks of procrastination. During the 2016-17 season, Conceiçao guided the Canaries from 19th to 7th place, the best ranking since the club was bought by Kita 17 years ago. The name of Habib Beye, already mentioned recently in Rennes, also comes up in the press, but his lack of experience, in a club which prefers coaches with long CVs, is a hindrance.
With this entry into contention in the Coupe de France, Antoine Kombouaré dreams “why not (to) redo the identical courses to my last two seasons here”where the Canaries had played two finals, one won in 2022 and one lost in 2023, during his first stint on the yellow and green bench.
Then it will be a truce. “We only have a short week, it’s short, and then, with what we’ve been through there, the championship which is tough and all that, we also have to know how to cut, to recharge the batteries, then after coming back, because it’s the second part (of the season) that will count”explained the coach who set the date of the resumption, with or without him, for December 29.
