Basketball / Elan Béarnais: “relegation is not an option” for Sébastien Ménard
“I think the boys are extremely motivated, I know they are capable of great things. Sometimes there is magic, genius, confusion, and then sometimes we miss it. Also, the high number of “we misses” means we’re having trouble ranking today. »
Are you surprised or disappointed to find the team in second place after nineteen rounds?
“There’s…
“I think the boys are extremely motivated, I know they are capable of great things. Sometimes there is magic, genius, confusion, and then sometimes we miss it. Also, the high number of “we misses” means we’re having trouble ranking today. »
Are you surprised or disappointed to find the team in second place after nineteen rounds?
“There are things that happen on the floor and things that happen in transitions. Win or lose, we are reorganizing SASP, structuring it on a different basis, sound, robust, verifiable. The club needs it. If we lose because we don’t have a bench, it’s not because we didn’t do what we said we could do, the real problem is that the club, last season, was atomised! And it still has ongoing consequences. »
Financial results over and over again?
“We should have been in a net positive position of €500,000 to bring in the two players missing today. Except to the contrary, you have the League telling you to “pay your dues, then hire.” What we do, we pay every month, we honor the obligations to our partners and service providers to clear the liabilities, which was not the case last season. It’s tedious work, really underappreciated. We have three years to resolve the liabilities and three years to resolve the protracted situation. It doesn’t please my predecessors to say this, and I’m not just talking about Americans, but it’s true. »
“At the same time, we have a new organization plan, a new management team, our sponsors and partners who are striving, our community, which despite the small heat problems, is very caring, we are helped and supported. »
Despite several announcement effects, why is the team still not strengthened?
“Because we were accepted by agents and players in three profiles. We made a bet with Rickey McGill that we lost even though we had all the legal, social, fiscal and medical protections. It happened to us!
Then another player of ours (Joshua Hamilton, leader of Silute in Lithuania, editor’s note) used us to negotiate better to stay at his club. He swore to us that he wanted to leave and join Pau because he told his coach he was angry at his death. We do whatever it takes to get him to come and finally he decides to stay! The latest, Rayvonte Rice, is absolutely over the moon: sign the deal, sign the deal! Before boarding the plane, he calls to break the deal. He tells us that his wife is pregnant and that he must stay with her because her pregnancy is at risk. How do you answer that!
Between Hamilton and Rice, we had another 35-year-old who wanted to come. He was in the US, ex-Bulls. He tells Audrey (Saure) how happy he is to come and finish his career in France. It was a great move… At the last minute she informed us that she was divorced and had child custody issues. I even thought it was a lie when his agent told us! So either we’re unlucky, or the market is particularly poor, or we’re having fun, or all of the above!”
Are you surprised by the modus operandi of the medium you discover?
“When people told me before, I didn’t believe it. I’ve been told that basketball is controlled and tested by agents, and that’s what I’m humbly learning on my own. I believe that the influence of agents is inversely proportional to the level of values they espouse. I’m not used to working like this. »
Is the word “drop” taboo within the club?
“No, it’s not taboo, it’s just not possible. I am just a referral sponsor. I am not old enough to devote all my time to the club and my ill-gotten wealth. Last year they came to buy me because of the lack of fighters and therefore the lack of buyers. We, the project, is to save Elan in the elite. Otherwise, I would have acted like a bunch of ill-intentioned observers who wanted to restore the club as amateurs last year. I am not one of them, I did not come for this. Today we are doing the work, because no one wanted to do it, we guaranteed several hundred thousand euros, I can’t do more than that. »
