Lens has “a psychological advantage” before the semi-final of the Coupe de France, believes Pierre Sage: the TFC will have to perform to turn the tables

Arriving at Blagnac airport around 3 a.m., during the night from Friday to Saturday, the TFC players will have had time to ruminate on what they missed to beat Lens in Ligue 1 (3-2), and to measure the gap to be filled to create the feat, Tuesday evening in the semi-final of the Coupe de France on the same pitch, against the second in the championship. They were missing a player, of course, and Yann Gboho, shot dead in the Toulouse locker room at Bollaert after being sent off in the 17th minute, will miss out on the major event of the season for his team, which must go all-in on this meeting at very high altitude. Because if the Violets still have to watch their backs in the championship, where the specter of a collapse exists and could put an end to the constant progression of TFC in the final ranking since the arrival of Carles Martinez Novell on the bench, this semi-final is the last opportunity to make a season that is otherwise neither totally failed nor really successful.

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Returning to the Stade de France, three years after lifting the Cup there at the end of an enchanted night (5-1 victory in the final against Nantes), would be a feat bordering on exceptional for a club not necessarily destined for these heights in a competition confiscated by PSG, winner eight times in the last eleven editions. The last team to have got their hands on the trophy in place of the monster of the capital, the TFC could find Strasbourg or Nice in Saint-Denis on May 22, and deprive Lens of the joy of finally registering its name on the list of winners of this Cup which has eluded it since its creation in 1918.

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To get there, Rasmus Nicolaisen and his teammates will have to come out alive from a Bollaert stadium white-hot by Friday’s stunning scenario, and Pierre Sage, the Lensois coach, was not wrong in declaring that he preferred “to be in (his) situation than that of Toulouse” and assuring that this victory was “a real psychological advantage.”

“The Cup is different”

After this first battle during which Sage and Martinez Novell did not launch all their strength (Thauvin and Edouard on the bench at kick-off on the Lensois side, Diop, Sidibé and Methalie on the Toulouse side), the two young coaches (46 years old for Sage, 41 for Martinez Novell) the two coaches, who appreciate each other and appreciate each other’s work, will meet again for a second round which is probably more muscular, certainly more decisive and where each blow will do more harm to the opponent. “The Cup is different. It’s 90 minutes, there are no overtimes, the scenario of the match can change very often”, knows Carles Martinez Novell, always excited by this kind of challenge and who demonstrated his know-how during big matches.

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In the quarter-final, in Marseille, the Catalan knew that each minute spent remaining in contact with the Olympians was a minute which increased the pressure on his opponent’s shoulders. The Marseillais did not know how to manage it, letting qualification slip against the Violets whose serenity during the penalties that evening was enough to reassure them before their return to Bollaert. “We have already been to the Vélodrome, we are capable of doing it in Lens” assures the Toulouse coach. In October 2023, after taking five from Liverpool in the Europa League (5-1), he told his players: “Take me for crazy, but I know how we are going to beat them in the return match.” The Violets won 3-2 in what remains one of the Haut-Garonne club’s finest nights. Time has passed and circumstances are very different today, but it never hurts to remember and dream a little.