From Captain to Coach: Didier Digard

Whilst Will Still has stolen most of the plaudits - as we glance unironically at last weeks article - there is another, similarly inexperienced, young gaffer making waves in Ligue Un.

You’re never too old for work experience. Learning on the job is something everyone goes through, but when your whole career has been designed around advanced preparation before making a public appearance, managing OGC Nice at the drop of a hat might, to you, appear a daunting prospect.

It’s true, you can’t train to be a manager in the same way you can a player. Didier Digard was a workhorse with the ball at his feet, but there was no guarantee that’d fly with the team in his hands. It’s the very reason Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard are jobless, and their perceived immortality doesn’t transfer from one profession to another.

So, what do you need? Just as developing as a young player, a few principles can keep you in the room a little longer: Humility, a willingness to learn, a clear reason for being there? Perhaps, yes. These can’t hurt. But this is a results game too, not just an emotional maturity test. Winning games is really all that can keep you in the room. Forget identity and fanciful visions, you must buy yourself the time to implement your philosophy, and the only way to do that is to win football matches. The very best managers have a sound grasp of emotion and psychology, but if your success isn’t tangible, it’s curtains.

Since taking over as interim manager of Nice — levelling up from his time as B-team Head Coach — Digard has taken the team on an unbeaten run of 14 games, including eight wins, finally ending on 8th April to a star-studded PSG side. Call it what you please, the ‘manager bounce’ or a breakthrough performance, the story right now is: all’s well in the Nice camp.

Digard is only 36. This may not be the breakthrough some think it is. If he does decide to retreat back behind the veil, and again learn to earn before, once more, breaking into the foreground, then he’d be showing that humility and thoughtfulness. And if perchance, this wave they’re riding continues to roll sans souci, then he should let it, and stay in the room.

For those upstairs at the club, the sense of how well Digard’s doing will be largely dictated by the mood among the fans, and Nice have some happy fans. The football has been fluid; expansive, to an extent. The players are offering themselves off the ball, in contrast to their languid play under 65-year-old Lucien Favre. They needed a reboot and they’ve got it. Is their offering a sign? Are they offering for a type of leader that for so long they never had?

If they’d carried on their form under Favre, they’d currently be in a relegation battle with just over a quarter of the season left to play. The Nice we see now — zestful, liberated — have eight games to battle for a European finish.

In a strange way, it almost doesn’t matter. You tell that to the players, they’ll tell you they’re in tunnel vision. You tell that to Digard, he’ll reject such thoughts as foolish and hostile to the drive of the team. But the reality is, Nice have found their antidote for now, at least. Digard’s giving what they need, European finish or not. And if it only goes downhill from here, hindsight shouldn’t render this wave a fugitive peak, a deviation from the mean. Remember to remember all the positives and be strong in that will. Digard’s still learning, and Nice are still fighting.

Aidan Smith (@AidanTheSmith)