After four seasons in Schio, Italy, for his first and only stint abroad, Pierre Vincent (57) returns to ASVEL to coach the women’s section. The former coach of the Bleues delivers the details of the preparation of his new workforce and the club’s objectives between Eurocup and the championship.
It’s a comeback to ASVEL for you, seven years later, with a different cap, from men to women. Today, the ASVEL institution has grown. How do you approach this return to Tony Parker’s club?
“I’m not approaching it from the angle of what happened previously. I did things before with and without ASVEL, there were things after. I am coming back to a club which has a lot of ambition, which is coming out of a disappointing season and which wants to perform. It’s a real challenge, especially since our start to the season will be very complicated (Editor’s note: Charleville-Mézières, Estudiantes Madrid, Basket Landes, and Ulriken or Liège outside and Landerneau, Villeneuve d’Ascq, Ruzomberok at home in October). It will be necessary to pass this course as best as possible. “
What have you learned during four seasons at Schio, an Italian basketball hotspot?
“I’ve already learned Italian, I’ve learned to eat Italian, to drink Italian (laughs). What is interesting when you change country is to appropriate the culture. There are still different styles and Italian basketball has a particular style. At Schio, I had several teams with different basketball identities. The question I had was to get the players to stick to the ideas I had with the best means to make them effective. We adjusted year after year and it worked pretty well. “
In Lyon, how does the message get across at the start of preparation?
“I find the girls very involved and diligent. You have to understand that we left with a team that was very unbalanced since the summer was quite hectic and the team we were supposed to have changed. We started with a very different style. The difficulty for me today is to recover Olympian players who arrived late. To have good players, I would be in a bad position to complain (laughs), but there are also constraints: they come late, worn out physically for some and mentally for all. And at the same time, you have to prepare. We are in a double injunction to prepare and modify a style at the same time. We haven’t played any friendly matches so far. We are in doubt but at the same time, I am not panicked because, as we are very late, we need to work. “
What do you mean by an unbalanced team?
“The imbalance lies in two things. First of all, we have a rather dense external sector and an internal sector which is rather poor in numbers. The fact that Helena comes back among us, it rebalances us a lot …
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Photo : Pierre Vincent (Euroleague)
