Azzedine Ounahi, a “simple little guy from Casa” who became big – Liberation

The 22-year-old Moroccan midfielder, who passed through Avranches and Angers, saw his rating explode at the World Cup.

“When Azzedine Ounahi arrived [à l’été 2021], the club preserved him, he played little. He was skinny [1,82m, 62 kg, ndlr], came from the lower divisions and did not have the profile of a Ligue 1 player. Despite flashes, a large volume of play and an incredible vista, he remained irregular. This is what happens to Moroccans in the World Cup, but the reality is that we will be able to sell him and Boufal in the winter transfer window for a good price, just to start on a good footing in the League. 2, next year.” As surely as he has mourned the presence of SCO Angers, bottom of Ligue 1, among the French elite, Jean-Hugues Malnar, a somewhat cynical Kop de la Butte supporter, no longer believes that the two Moroccan internationals who enchant the world in Qatar will stay in Maine-et-Loire after Christmas. Moreover, Ounahi has already been announced at OM, at Torino, or even outright at Barça. In his own way, Luis Enrique, the skipper of La Roja, took charge of his promotion after the elimination of the Spaniards in the round of 16: “Madre Mía, but where does this guy come from? He never stops.”

Passed by the youth teams of Raja Casablanca, the Moroccan international (22 years old) will branch off as a teenager to the Mohammed VI Academy, the Moroccan football training center, in the suburbs of Rabat, from where are also released Youssef En-Nesyri and Nayef Aguerd. On the occasion of a tour in the west of France of the said nursery, the SCO of Angers, seduced by the mastery of the player, comes to the information. Ounahi finally opts for RC Strasbourg, where he will not play any match with the A team.

“At the end of 2019, everyone was in agreement for him to sign a contract. The Covid arrived and it didn’t happen. There were internal disagreements between the president who was favorable and technicians who were hostile to him going pro,” remembers one of the trainers from Strasbourg. For a few months, Ismail Mouline, his agent, struggles to find him a club: it will be in Avranches (Manche) in National, the third French level.

A year to bounce back

The Channel club, which offers him a meager salary (2,000 euros monthly) in force for this division, recovers a player defeated by his Alsatian failure and the fear of seeing his dream of making football a profession collapse. “It was complicated to get him out of his reserve. He didn’t know us, didn’t necessarily believe in us, informs Gilbert Guérin, the president of Avranches. As the season went on, he got up to what he could produce and we quickly realized his great qualities.

It will only take him a year to bounce back. His brilliant season in National arouses envy. Modest English clubs, Caen, point the tip of their noses, but it is Angers who wins the jackpot for the modest sum of 75,000 euros (plus bonus). “Azz” starts on tiptoe before making its way. Gérald Baticle, the coach of the SCO, the household, grants him recovery beaches despite his extraordinary endurance (13 to 15 kilometers covered at each meeting). “I am not a player who likes to duel. I try to avoid them as much as possible, because almost all the players are stronger than me. I try to play fast, to get out of the density thanks to my ball grip”, he explained in the fall of 2021, in West France.

For two years, Azzedine Ounahi, who had dragged on the way a little, has been climbing the stairs four by four. Six months after his arrival in Angers, Vahid Halilhodzic called him up for the African Cup of Nations in Cameroon. He will not leave the team again. Fourteen capes and ten months later, he is in the semi-finals of the World Cup, expecting better. “He did well to stay in Angers to play and improve. He combines great physical skills with a subtle technique, it’s rare. He has digested everything that has happened to him for a year, it is a proof of wisdom”, advances the Franco-Bosnian technician.

advertising figure

Like Achraf Hakimi, the PSG player, Azzedine Ounahi has become an advertising figure for the Afriquia gas station chain. “There is your photo on panels. You have become free in people’s memory. From the airport, everyone recognizes you. Me, I’m still the simple little guy from Casa. I haven’t forgotten where it all started.” he said to Matin, the Moroccan daily last January. Whatever the results of the last two games of the Atlas Lions in Qatar, he will have to manage the backlash of the World Cup. “At the beginning of the year, I told him to strengthen his upper body. He must also watch his head. What’s happening to him is absolutely insane.” promet Vahid Halilhodzic.