Heavy defeat against Real Madrid in the Champions League (6-1), seven losses in the last eight matches in Ligue 1… the bad results are multiplying for the Monegasque coach. However, Sébastien Pocognoli continues to benefit from the confidence of his locker room.
Sébastien Pocognoli is still at the helm of the Monegasque ship, but until when? After the 6-1 rout in Madrid, the question did not seem (yet) to arise too much among the Monegasque leaders who proclaim (for the moment) stability and serenity.
Despite the seven defeats over the last eight days of the championship, the Belgian technician is still favored by his group, who appreciate his sessions but also the fact of having abandoned his preferential system of three defenders in November for a pattern more familiar to the locker room executives.
However, with eight losses in 18 matches on the ASM bench, Pocognoli still appears as confident in his locker room as in front of the microphones. “We will not take away the confidence or the positive side that I have in myself, with which I was educated. (…) When we see the training, we cannot realize that it is a group which has had a series of defeats over a short period. I have seen cracking locker rooms and that is not the case”, he indicated.
Increasing pressure
“No last chance match yet” he said to himself at La Turbie about the former Union Saint-Gilloise coach, who would especially suffer from a global context: failed summer preparation, full infirmary, disappointing executives, failed transfer window…
If the Belgian technician will therefore be on the Monaco bench this Saturday January 24 in Le Havre, a match “of very high importance to get back on track”, the pressure inevitably increases on his shoulders. Dmitri Rybolovlev is carefully monitoring the situation. The Russian president of Monaco thus brought the group together on Wednesday morning in Madrid to have explanations on the current level of his troops.
Furthermore, “in the middle of the transfer window” it seems “hard to imagine” they say within the Principality club, to part ways with general director Thiago Scuro and/or technical director Carlos Avina. If the coaching market is monitored just in case, an offensive element is still hoped to compensate for the rupture of Takumi Minamino’s cruciate ligaments and bring a different profile, more impactful and athletic.
The returns of the Senegalese Lamine Camara and Krépin Diatta (still ill), recent winners of the CAN, are likely to hope for better days, starting with Saturday in Le Havre then Wednesday at home against Juve. Two meetings considered crucial at La Turbie, for the future of some and for the interest of the end of the season.
