When speaking to the press, Patrick Vieira, honestly explained that Bordeaux had been better than the Gym, but was delighted with the solidarity and generosity of his players who held on to the victory.

Patrick, we saw a brave OGC Nice this evening…

It’s this solidarity that allowed us to win. It was a very complicated match, a difficult one against a very good Bordeaux side. In terms of the control, the technical quality, they were better than us. But we made up for the areas that we were lacking, with a desire to do well, generosity and solidarity.

Do you think that this will be enough in the long term?

I hope so, it’s already a good start. It’s the minimum you need in order to hope to build a good team in the future. The good style, we want to play that way, of course, but against a side like Bordeaux, it’s tough. We had intentions, playing out from the back, but we made too many mistakes in the build up.

The context was still unique…

The context doesn’t matter. What I want to see is that we are consistent over 90 minutes. We didn’t drop in that area and I am very happy. The last two days have been difficult for everyone but we felt a desire to do things well from the players, to send a message to the world showing what it means to be OGC Nice.

Has giving up ever crossed your mind?

Giving up? Me? Never. There are highs and lows, of course, but on the whole I am happy, I am at a good club here at OGC Nice.

The supporters chanted your name…

It’s important and it really touches me. When we say “the club”, that includes everybody, the supporters included, it’s a family.

Eddy Sylvestre was interesting once again…

Yes. I didn’t expect him to last for 90 minutes, even though physically, it was tough for him in the final quarter of an hour. He is very intelligent, plays well between the lines, has a very good first touch, towards goal. He is still young, but he had a very good game. Cement a place in the squad? That depends on what he does going forward.

You also started Ihsan Sacko for the first time this season in Ligue 1.

He put in a lot of effort, he worked for the team. We need to work to improve his finishing but he helped the team a lot.

You are currently in sixth. Do you attribute a lot of importance to the current league position?

Yes, it’s important. It’s better to be here than at the bottom. But then the league is very tight, a run of 2-3 matches in either way could change the table a lot.

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