VIDEO. TFC: “We were beating everyone!” Cédric Carrasso talks about his incredible and unique season in Toulouse
In an interview broadcast on Youtube and the Colinterview channel, Cédric Carrasso, former TFC goalkeeper, tells many anecdotes about his arrival, his year and his departure from the Pink City.
His arrival in Toulouse
After a white season with Marseille, due to an injury, Cédric Carrasso decided to relaunch with TFC in 2008. “I arrived in Toulouse and everything changed. Back to training I I thought I had the wrong day because there were no supporters. In Marseille, when we restarted there were always 3-4000 people, here it was very quiet. A family club set back from rugby, where there are fewer leaders,” said the former TFC goalkeeper.
An amazing season
After a very difficult 2007-2008 season where the Toulouse saved themselves in extremis by finishing first in non-relegation in 17th place, Cédric Carasso recounts the start of his only 2008-2009 season under the colors of the TFC: “We are doing a lot of preparation, the young people are really not bad. Then I heard: ‘Toulouse they are going to blow themselves up, they are going to go down, they have no one left…’
He then lists the Toulouse workforce for this season: “Carrasso, Mauro Cetto, Jérémy Matthieu, Cheikh Mbengue, Albin Ebondo, Etienne Capoue, Moussa Sissoko, Etienne Didot, André-Pierre Gignac … I forget some of them. is an amazing band.
With this group, the TFC is having one of its best seasons. “We conceded 27 goals in the season. It’s the best season I’ve had in terms of goals conceded. We end up best defense in the championship, André-Pierre top scorer. We’re 4th in the championship and we were beating everyone. We had a crazy team”, explains the former Toulouse goalkeeper who rediscovered the French team that season as third goalkeeper behind Hugo Lloris and Steve Mandanda.
An incredible departure
But following that season, the doorman received an offer from Bordeaux, reigning French champion and who will compete in the Champions League. An offer difficult to refuse for Cédric Carrasso who absolutely wants to join the Girondin rival. Except that Olivier Sadran, president of the TFC, does not agree. The 41-year-old former footballer recounts the incredible negotiations with Sadran, who wanted to keep him at all costs. “In 15 minutes, I had more than doubled my salary. 10 more minutes and I tripled it”.
Finally the TFC agrees to sell Carrasso if an offer of 8 million euros, a very important amount at the time, arrives on its table. Negotiations drag on between the two clubs, who cannot find common ground. “I was on a plane for my holidays and I had a stopover in Doha. I turn on my phone and in my head it was dead. My agent calls me and says to me: ‘Cédric we are at a standstill. Bordeaux is 7.5 million and no more and Olivier wants 8 and will not let go. And I say to my agent: ‘In Bordeaux you tell them that in my first year, they take the 500,000 euros that are missing from me and I pay them’. The offer is accepted.”
Son biggest regret
“I have no regrets about my career. If I had to do it all over again, I would do it the same way. My only regret is not having stayed longer in Toulouse”, explains Cédric Carrasso. He concluded: “Toulouse is a club that I have loved in a year.”