“The circumstances were not ideal”: the reactions after the Nantes-AS Monaco match (0-0)
Antoine Kombouaré (Nantes coach)
“It’s a fair draw, each team had its half. We suffered a lot in the first half, Monaco had the opportunities to hurt us, then we corrected things well. We played a great team which is superior to us. Henrique? He gave us a lot of problems. We first had trouble blocking the first raises, to prevent Diop and Volland from turning around. We reorganized into 3-4-3. We then blocked the corridors and the offensive tendencies of this Monaco team.“
Philippe Clément (Monaco coach)
“I always want to win and that we have winners in the locker room. I saw a team that wanted to impose a pendant the whole game. We started well, we chose and had chances, but the goal did not come. The circumstances were not ideal. When you have to replace two defenders (Badiashile and Sidibé, Editor’s note) on injury in the first period (ASM even ended up with three injuries in total with Boadu) … The tempo then dropped and our offensive players had less spaces. We had no balance and Nantes took advantage of the spaces, counter-attacks and stopped phases. Some of our passes weren’t ideal either. I knew when I arrived, the offensive animation is one of the points that can be improved. We have to create more opportunities but finding the automatisms takes time. It doesn’t happen in four days of work. The match can be different if we score on Diop’s first chance. Boadu also has a great opportunity to decide the match … The tenure of Henrique in playmaker? With the absences due to injuries and the Covid, you had to be creative. I spoke to him before the game and he was ready to play in this position. He told me that it had evolved among the young people. He did his job well. The three injured? I can’t say what they have. I hope it won’t be serious, but we have to assess all this with the doctor. The standings and the six points behind second place? I don’t want to start calculating. We just have to think about improving our game. My first one? I’m happy, I have a motivated team with a lot of talent. Even if it will take me a while to get my ideas into the heads of the players. “
Aurélien Tchouaméni (middle of Monaco, microphone of Canal +)
“We gave everything, especially since we finished at 10 for a good ten minutes. We had a good state of mind, it was not enough to win this match but I think it bodes well for the future. The coach has been there for 4 days, we have already seen certain principles of the game, we will have to continue working to earn points. We tried to put in place these new playing principles: play forward, as quickly as possible, going all the way. But, what we have to remember is our defensive strength, we were solid until the end.“
Eliot Matazo (Monaco midfielder)
“It wasn’t easy because we had to make three changes due to injuries. There is disappointment, because we came here to win, but we have to keep the positive, we tried to win the match until the last minute. We had chances, even at 10 against 11. The coach did not want to upset everything that was already good with the former coach (Kovac), but we put a lot of intensity at the start of the match. We will work to have more automatisms and apply our requests.“