When Louis XVI decided to inaugurate the Palace of Versailles in 1651, the monarch was not aware that it would have a direct impact when deciding a semi-final of the Coupe de France. A little more than 300 years remained for football to establish itself in society and the luxurious town next to Paris has always been visited by tourists to see the Palace and not to enter the Stade Montbaurona venue with less than 8,000 spectators where matches are played on FC Versaillesa team from National 2 (French fourth division) looking to make history tonight against Nice in the Coupe de France semi-finals.
The institution of the Parisian region has had to travel to the south of France to face what is, to date, the most important match in its history. The reason he can’t hold the semi-final at the Montbauron goes back to an absurd law. In France, for example, it is criminalized to call your pig Napoleon Bonaparte. If someone decides to give the mammal such a name, he could be prosecuted in court. Another law that makes no sense is the one introduced during the reign of Louis XIV, which established that no establishment could be lit within five kilometers of the King’s roomso the Stade Montbauron, which is exactly three kilometers from the Palace, cannot host any matches after sunset.
This absurd law can force Versailles to move out of their stadium. If the team gets promoted to National, next season he would play most of his games on Friday nightso it would be impossible to play for Montbauron in the event of promotion due to a law that it continues without being challenged or without having a bill to reform it before a French society that maintains many of the symbols of the absolute Monarchies.
Parisian towns Nor have they helped Versailles to find a stadium that prevents them from traveling to the Coupe de France match. In a tweet, the modest Yvelines club he mentioned PSG to leave him the Parc des Princesa request rejected by the current leader of Ligue 1, who claimed that is in full reform of the lawn and could not give up the Boulogne facilities tonight. In addition to the rejections by several teams in the region (Paris FC’s stadium, the Charléty, is also unable to host the match due to the incidents against Lyon), the high cost of organizing matches of this caliber is another impediment for the most modest teams in Gallic football. If PSG had agreed to leave him the Parc des Princes, Versailles would have been forced to pay €250,000 for all the deployment around the contestextraordinary figures that are not covered, not even remotely, with the price of tickets and with a high risk that the stadium will not be filled.
FC Versailles is not just any team in French football today. It is obvious that it does not have the pull of other teams in the region due to its proximity to one of the most important Palaces in modern history, but it ishe club has 1,200 sports licenses distributed throughout the training center. Hatem Ben Arfa passed through here when he was just 12 years old, giving his first blows before becoming one of the greatest promises of French football. But not only that. Thierry Henry and Jerôme Rothen coincided in the U15 team during the 1992/199 season3 before becoming, especially the first, great stars of European football.
In Yvelines, football is experiencing a historic season, whether for the leadership of National 2 (tied on points with the Lorient subsidiary) or for the semi-finals of the Coupe de France. But you have to go back to 2021 to understand the reasons why Versailles is the way it is right now. In October, Daniel Voisin, the emblematic president of the entity who had been in office since 2004, left the club after 18 years of administration due to discrepancies with the coachYoussef Chibhi. In the midst of the “crisis” that seemed to completely change the dimension of Versailles, several investors landed in the west of Ile-de-France to seek immediate promotion to National 1 and try, in the short term, to establish itself for the first time in its history in the elite of French football.
With Daniel Voisin, the Versalles was one of the lowest budgets of National 2 with just €350,000 of solvency. The Parisians came close to suffering consequences from the DNCG, the financial body that supervises the accounts each year of the French teams, but the arrival of new investors placed it in a new dimension. For this, and just before leaving, surprisingly, the presidency, he decided to hAbout the Versailles an SAS (Sports Limited Company) to accommodate new companies investing in Yvelines. Bingo and Fiducim – City-Gc, a real estate company, increased the budget to €2 million, which made Versailles one of the clubs with the largest financial fund in all of modest French football.
Another of the great figures of Versailles is, without a doubt, Jean-Luc Arribart. In the run-up to the meeting, the general director spoke to Diario AS, assuring that, for once in the history of the city, everyone will talk about football and not the Palacewhich receives millions of tourists every year due to the spectacular structure that gives meaning and color to a city full of luxuries and tranquility through its wide streets. The former Rennes player and former Lens sporting director has become a figure within France thanks to his great analyzes of the Premier League What do you do every weekend? “It is a completely different world to analyze the Premier and be managing a football team. It cannot be compared”, stresses Arribart, who was placed in October by Fiducim-City-Gc in the Versailles board and that, since then, the management could not have been more brilliant.
Former partner of Arsène Wenger, with whom he has a magnificent relationship and sometimes golf partner of Nantes coach Antoine Kombouaré, Arribart maintains a great relationship with the greatest personalities of French football to try to get them to invest in a team unknown to most of society. “The most important thing is to get promoted to National. I have told my players not to have pressure, that they play as if it were a game of the Play, that what matters is the promotion. It would matter more to me not to be promoted than to reach the final of the Coupe de France”, recognized Arribart to Diario AS last Friday. For Arribart to be promoted would be great news, since Versalles he would play most of his games on Friday nights and could combine his position as a commentator for Canal Plus
The average number of journalists who cover the Versailles training sessions does not amount to more than ten people each week. Just before training at Clarefontaine, a ground granted to him by the French Football Federation, which is responsible for the Coupe de France, to prepare for the match against Nice, more than 60 journalists, including Diario AS and the English Guardian, attended the training of the Parisians with the aim of trying to tell first-hand an event that could be historic within the city. This Monday he trained at the Louis II to acclimatize to the same measures as the Nice pitch and the climate of the south of France (the opposite of Paris, which is very close to the north) and this morning he left for the beautiful city of the Côte d’Azur to concentrate on the hours before the semifinals.
Versailles coach Youssef Chibhi, is a legend of the French institution. He landed when he was only 18 years old, He was a first-team footballer for 16 seasons before taking the step to the bench. “We know that we are capable of competing in these types of matches. The goal is still to climb, but it is clear that we dream of reaching the final of the Coupe de France. We do not limit ourselves. The pressure is from Nice, which will have a full stadium and needs to win a title after the investment from Ineos“, the coach acknowledged to Diario AS after the morning training with a multitude of journalists last Friday. For Diego Michel, one of the best players in the squad and who dreams of playing in Spain one day, the fact of being able to win the Cup has mentioned in the locker room: “It is true that we want to be promoted, but reaching the semifinals of the Cup and being able to win it is something that we have already discussed, albeit very briefly, inside the locker room. Let’s dream. Dreaming is free,” she added.
The trip, the hotel and everything essential for the match has been fully paid for by Nicewho has made a beautiful gesture with a team affected by an absurd law of which there has not been, for more than 300 years, a single amendment to allow Versailles to play in their stadium after sunset. The last French fourth division team to reach a Cup final was Les Herbiers in 2018, which fell with great dignity 0-2 against PSG. In case of victory, It remains to be seen if UEFA would allow a non-professional team to participate in the Europa League and if the LFP would allow a team that is neither in Ligue 1 nor in Ligue 2 (both divisions are its competitions and not National or National 2, which belong to the Federation) to play the French Super Cup. Tonight, in Nice, the story could have a happy ending for the team pushed aside by the Monarchy of Louis XIV.