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Day: 27 July 2022

Laurent Banide: “I want to take ASM Women as high as possible”

by: Luke Entwistle
27/07/2022

Monaco Life catches up with recently-appointed AS Monaco Women’s manager Laurent Banide to talk about writing a new chapter in the Principality, his brief English excursion, and the state of women’s football.

Former AS Monaco manager Laurent Banide was last week appointed as the new head coach of the AS Monaco Women’s team, replacing Stéphane Guigo. Since his short spell as manager of the men’s side in 2010/11, the nomadic Frenchman has had multiple spells in the Middle East, including with the Kuwait national team, before most recently taking charge of League Two side Oldham Athletic. However, all roads lead back to Monaco, and Banide is eager to get started in his new role.

Monaco Life: After a short break since the end of your spell with Oldham in 2019, what motivated you to return to management with ASM Women?

Laurent Banide: When the investors Peak6 contacted me a few weeks ago, I made my decision very quickly. During that meeting I was very moved by Jérôme de Bontin’s speech. What convinced me was that there was already a beautiful project led by de Bontin and the president RudyTarditi; a project to take a team as high as possible, just like Lyon and PSG have done with their women’s teams. It is a very interesting project, and in addition that allowed me to stay at home, with my family and friends. It is very interesting to work at home and in such a super project.

Was there also an element of wanting to return to the Principality and write a new chapter after your various spells with AS Monaco, both as the first-team manager and as head coach of the academy side?

As you say, it’s quite a long story! Firstly, it was my dad’s region (Gérard Banide) and then mine. It’s already been about 40 years that we’ve been working in Monaco. We’ve all been in the Principality and we have an attachment to the country. It’s clear from my point of view that I should continue with Monaco.

Following your arrival in mid-season in 2010/11, you couldn’t save Monaco from relegation to Ligue 2. Do you have an overriding memory of that spell?

I don’t have a bad memory from that time. We build from successes and from defeats. We took 25 points from the 19 matches. But unfortunately, we lacked a little something; not a lot but just a bit. There was the odd injury, the conceding of a goal in the last minute. These things happen. Unfortunately, it was difficult for me and for everybody, for the supporters as well. Still, it allowed the club to bounce back and create this new story with the new owners. It was difficult to take.

Of course, taking the job with the women’s team, it’s in a different sector, but it is one that is developing enormously. It’s the future. It’s gradual, and on an individual level the players are becoming stronger, and there are more and more people involved in it. It’s an evolution of football and I am very happy to take charge of AS Monaco.

Following numerous spells in the Middle East, you moved to Oldham Athletic, a team in turmoil and with an extraordinarily high managerial turnover that has since dropped out of the football league. How do you evaluate your brief spell in English football?

I was very moved by the passion of the people over there. It was magnificent. There were huge amounts of supporters at the matches, and the passion of all those working at the club was magnificent. Unfortunately, as you say, it was a bit of a delicate period at the club, with lots of managerial changes. We worked a lot to try and bring a bit of calmness and balance. But unfortunately, it was difficult and very delicate for the management. As soon as things started to go badly, they just moved onto the next thing. It is regrettable because we really hadn’t been in the job long and it’s life. That’s how we grow. It’s unfortunate.

What have you been doing since that dismissal time in 2019?

My family was in London so I went to live with them and made the most of the London life. Because of Covid, I stayed a bit between London and Monaco, watching some Chelsea matches, some Monaco matches. The Covid period was a quiet one for me.

In general terms, how do you perceive the rise of the women’s game?

It’s the evolution of things! As you said, I noticed in the parks in England lots of girls play football, which isn’t something that I’ve seen here in the south of France. I think it’s true that in Anglo-Saxon countries there is already good evolution in terms of women’s football. There are a few training centres that have grown in Paris and Lyon and which bring the level of women’s football up. I think we have to follow this direction to be able to get a team promoted into the first division. It would be great for the Principality.

AS Monaco Women missed out narrowly on promotion last season. What are the objectives for the upcoming campaign?

Of course, the objective is to get promoted (to D3). We’re trying to build a great team for the coming years. It will take a little bit of time. Unfortunately, last season the final game was decided by small details. We have to forget that and look to the future and create a high-performing team.

The start of pre-season is on 1st August. I can’t wait to be on the ground, to meet the team, to work with my staff and to bring my experience in professional football and take them as high as possible.

 

 

Video: Charlotte Casiraghi stars in new Chanel soundtrack

by: Stephanie Horsman
27/07/2022

Charlotte Casiraghi’s relationship with Chanel deepens as she stars in the bizarre haute couture house’s autumn/winter 2022-23 soundtrack video by French singer and composer Sébastien Tellier.

Charlotte Casiraghi, daughter of Princess Caroline of Hanover, has been rocking Chanel for years. Her involvement with the legendary French fashion house became official on 1st January 2021 when a video came out announcing she had been selected to be an ambassador for the company.

She has taken this role seriously, as shown in her joining a few innovative and out of the ordinary events. In March 2021, she lent her face to the spring/summer 2021 ready-to-wear collection in an advertising campaign produced by the Dutch duo Inez & Vinoodh. The backdrop was the Principality and it featured many emblematic local sites.

Only a few months ago, Casiraghi opened Chanel’s spring/summer 2022 show by arriving on horseback.

Now, she has gone one step further with the release of a new video by the brand. It was written and composed by Sébastien Tellier and features not only her voice, but also her acting as she appears alongside Tellier and other models, all debuting pieces from the new line.

The video is, in a word, surreal. Casiraghi, Tellier and the models inhabit a whimsical place with corgis, paper sharks and childlike representations of “paper” submarines and boats.

Casiraghi had already worked with the singer during a musical performance at the end of the Chanel cruise show in May 2021. This new project, entitled Mademoiselle, was written as a nod to the fashion house’s iconic founder, Coco Chanel.

This new video shows that she is a confident woman and very comfortable in her own Chanel-swathed skin.

See the video below…

 

 

Image taken from video

 

 

 

 

Tragedy as local man drowns at Larvotto Beach

by: Stephanie Horsman
27/07/2022

A 34-year-old man from Roquebrune has drowned during a night swim off Larvotto Beach. This is what we know so far. 

The normally tranquil Larvotto Beach cove was the scene of tragedy on Monday 18th July, when a man was found dead after what appears to be an accidental drowning.

According to Monaco Matin, police believe the 34-year-old man from the neighbouring town of Roquebrune-Cap-Martin was heavily intoxicated with alcohol at the time.

The drowning is thought to have occurred shortly before 11pm on the 18th.. A friend who had reportedly been with him that evening had called emergency services after failing to hear from his friend. Police arrived at the scene to find the man’s body a few metres from the shore.

Despite resuscitation efforts by emergency services, the man could not be revived and was pronounced dead at the scene.

The public prosecutor’s office of Monaco has now opened an inquiry into the cause of death and are asking the victim’s relatives and friends, as well as any possible witnesses who had been on the beach at the time, to come forward to help the investigation.

Results of the autopsy are yet to be released publicly. 

 

 

 

Photo credit: Michel Charbonnier

 

 

 

 

New exhibition: the Antarctic at the Oceanographic Museum

by: Stephanie Horsman
27/07/2022

To celebrate the 250th anniversary of the French discovery of the Crozet and Kerguelen islands in the Antarctic, the Oceanographic Museum is hosting two temporary exhibitions on the archipelagos as well as one on the Dumont d’Urville Scientific Station which now sits on land discovered by French explorer Jules Dumont d’Urville nearly a century later.

The Antarctic has always been a place that piques the imagination. Cold and infinitely unknowable, the frozen continent sits at the far end of the world, a distant and unforgiving land, yet one that intrepid explorers have not been able to resist.

In 1772, two sub-Antarctic island chains, the Crozet Islands and the Kerguelan Islands, were discovered in the Southern Indian Ocean just weeks apart. The Crozets, which total six islands, three of whom are considered major, was discovered by Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, aboard Le Mascarin. The Kerguelen’s main island was officially discovered by the French navigator Yves-Joseph de Kerguelen-Trémarec. The next day, Charles de Boisguehenneuc landed and claimed the island for the French crown.

Nearly a century later, in 1840, Terre Adélie, a strip of land that runs from the coastline to the South Pole, was put on the map by the French explorer Jules Dumont d’Urville.

Now, from 26th July to 26th September, the Oceanographic Museum is hosting two exhibits presented with the organisation French Southern and Antarctic Lands (TAAF). The shows are entitled ‘Crozet et Kerguelen 1772-2002’ and ‘From Dumont d’Urville at DDU: the French in Antarctica’, and encompass 40 panels using maps, archival documents, and historical and contemporary photos.

Visitors can step back in time and journey to the far reaches of the Earth where they can learn about the heritage these islands represent to the French as well as the issues currently facing them.

Larose Bay © Le Bouard

The two archipelagos are today protected within the national nature reserve of the French Southern Territories, elevated by UNESCO to the rank of world heritage of humanity site and form almost 10% of the exclusive economic zone of France, maritime space over which France has exclusive resource exploitation rights, and have become sanctuaries for global biodiversity.

The Kerguelen archipelago includes a set of small islands, the Prince-of-Monaco Islands, located in the southwest of the chain and named by explorer Raymond Rallier du Baty, around 1908, in honour of Prince Albert I. The Prince Albert Pass located to the west of the main island of Kerguelen was also named for the “Explorer Prince”.

In the ‘From Dumont d’Urville to DDU: the French in Antarctica’ exhibit, visitors take a chronological trip through time to see the French activity in the Antarctic, amongst them, the adventures of Jules Dumont d’Urville and Jean-Baptiste Charcot, two French figures in polar exploration, and the establishment of the first permanent scientific base in Terre Adelie after the Second World War respectively.

For those who crave more, Sciene Po writer and historian Bruno Fuligni will host a conference on 9thSeptember at 2:30pm called ‘The Kerguelens, 250 years of French presence’ outlining the quests made over the years in the Antarctic as well as attempts at colonisation.

 

 

 

Top photo of Baie de l’Oiseau and baby Albatros © Fabrice Lebouard 

 

 

 

Monaco resumes lifesaving child heart surgeries

by: Stephanie Horsman
27/07/2022

Heart operations for desperate children from developing nations have resumed in the Principality after over two years of disruption due to the global pandemic, with three children recently given the gift of life.

Monaco’s Cardiothoracic Centre has been working with the Monaco Collectif Humanitaire (MCH) since 2008 to operate on children, primarily living in Sub-Saharan Africa, who are in need of cardiac pathologies not available in their home countries.

The programme has changed the lives of 460 children to date and has been a huge success. Sadly, the Covid epidemic put a stop to the regular treatments for more than two years and are only now being resumed.

To jump-start the programme again, three children from Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Burundi were brought to Monaco where operations were carried out by the Centre’s new cardio-paediatric team made up of Professor Sylvie Di Filippo and Doctors Olivier Metton, Olivier Raisky, Stefano Di Bernardo and Aude Missana.

The MCH and the Cardio-Thoracic Centre also welcomed, alongside the children, several donors including the Monegasque Olympic Committee and the Compagnie Monégasque de Banque (CMB), who donated €42,195 from the ‘Six Star Medal’ obtained by Pascal Camia, the first Monegasque among those to finish the six races needed to be part of the ‘Abbot World Marathon Majors’.

The Six Star Medal is reserved for people who have completed the six World Marathon Majors, which are comprised of the Boston, Chicago, New York, Berlin, London and Tokyo Marathons. The figure of €42,195 is a nod to the distance in kilometres run during a marathon.

This donation was also collected thanks to the participation of footballer Olivier Giroud, Ambassador to the MCH.

Local association Monaco Aide et Présence was also present, as well as Rencontres Africaines and the Monaco Red Cross, which play an important role in the reception of children pre-surgery.