The former president of the French Football Federation, Claude Simonet, died on the night of Monday to Tuesday in Nantes at the age of 92, the newspaper announced on Wednesday. West France. An amateur player for FC Nantes in the 1950s, he took charge of the FFF in early 1994 in a difficult context, after the resignation of Jean Fournet-Fayard, weakened by the Furiani tragedy, the OM-VA affair and the disastrous France-Bulgaria. It will remain so until 2005.
Simonet was the strong man of French football at the time of the victories at the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000. It was he who had organized the recovery after the non-qualification for the 1994 World Cup, in particular by giving Jean -Claude Darmon, met in Nantes when he was vice-president of the club, the role of “great financier of football”, as told Release in 2002. The results of the Blues of Aimé Jacquet had done the rest.
The acme then the fall
“With his disappearance, French football loses a leader who marked the history of our sport, reacted the current coach and captain of the France team at the time, Didier Deschamps. Claude Simonet was an endearing man. By placing his trust in Aimé Jacquet, he brought the French team back on the path to success. I will keep strong images of him, of intense happiness. »
The end of the ruler’s reign, on the other hand, was more complicated. The problems began after the fiasco of the 2002 World Cup. It was the famous bottle of romanée-conti at 4,800 euros put on the account of the Fédé on the evening of the elimination, then the lawsuits for having concealed a hole of 13.9 million euros at the end of the following season. He was sentenced in 2007 to six months suspended prison sentence and a fine of 10,000 euros by the Paris Criminal Court.
