The 27-year-old French coach continues to multiply his exploits at the head of Stade d'Abidjan and is preparing to discover the group stage of the African Champions League. After recovering the club from the fight to remain in the Ivorian Ligue 1 18 months earlier, Alexandre Lafitte qualified his team in the death pool of the competition. The first opponent this Tuesday is the biggest possible piece: the double Egyptian title holder, Al-Ahly.
“It's going to be a big first for most of us, but we're looking forward to challenging ourselves with Al-Ahly. It's the Real Madrid of Africa. It's going to be a sick atmosphere, but we'll go to the Cairo to perform and try to bring home points,” assumes Alexandre Lafitte, still the youngest French first division coach in the world. The Girondin quickly understood the popular pressure that exists at Al-Ahly, twelve times winners of the Champions League, and above all seven times finalists over the last eight editions. “As soon as the draw was made, I had 35 requests for interviews from Egypt, live TV. They are football fanatics.”
With Roger Assalé in front, winner of CAN 2015
The French coach has awakened the national monument that is the Stade d'Abidjan, the first Ivorian winner of the continental competition in 1966 and the only local club entered in the group stage in 2024/2025. The first trip to Cairo will be special, “where players can win between 50,000 and 100,000 euros per month, another world.” He also knows that Group C is that of death, with the addition of the South Africans Orlando Pirates and the Algerians of CR Belouizdad “The Pirates are very strong. In preparation in Spain, they managed to hold draws against La Liga teams. It will be bustling there too.” If getting out of the pools would be a real achievement, the coach will not put the bus in front of the penalty area and will count in particular on his star recruit, Roger Assalé, African champion in 2015 with the Ivory Coast Elephants and former striker for Young Boys Bern, Werder Bremen and Dijon.
Assalé: “We can dream”
“There is a very big difference with the teams we are going to meet,” warns the wise Assalé, returning to the country after a long reflection. “The coach contacted me to get back into shape and then I found the challenge interesting, the Champions League had a lot of weight in my choice.” His story with Dijon ended very badly, completely put on the shelf despite an arrival for 4 million euros in 2020 and a confirmed goalscorer status in Switzerland, triple champion with Young Boys. “I don't want to talk about that anymore. Thank God, I still play football. We have to stay humble and think about this match in Cairo against Al Ahly. If we are serious and focused, we can dream but getting through the groups would be a feat.” The Ivorian club is counting on this center forward, “pro, mature, humble and who still scored against Real Madrid, the real one! (editor's note: in 2020 with Leganès in La Liga)”, Lafitte is delighted in advance.
For Assalé, Lafitte will become “a very, very great coach”
Lafitte will be in the stands, “for lack of a Champions League diploma”nt African, like Cairo Marcel Koller, former coach of Austria or coach of Cologne in the Bundesliga. “I can’t wait to see what I do in this competition, and if you get a result in Cairo, it puts a huge spotlight on the club.” Roger Assalé, surprised at first by the youth of his new coach, four years his junior, is certain of his future success. “He has a flair for football. I said to myself, 'Wow', it's impressive for his age. He studies everything, he will become a very, very great coach. He has the sensitivity for football, you don't see that so often I wish him to find even more extraordinary challenges than Abidjan for the rest of his career.”””
Lafitte will be in the stands, “for lack of a Champions League diploma”
To do this, we will first have to have a good Champions League campaign with Stade d'Abidjan, also in the fight for the Ivorian Ligue 1 title, while the last coronation dates back to 1969. “It's possible, but not so simple, because traveling in the Champions League, in Africa, sometimes takes a week to go to Egypt, we go through the Persian Gulf, we have to get used to the changes in climate… we will have an accumulation of. matches in late, but we won't be far away at the end of the season.” Exciting prospects for the young coach who unfortunately will not be on the sidelines on Tuesday at the Cairo International Stadium. “I don't have the required qualification for the Champions League yet… and people know me in Africa now so I can't be registered as a fitness trainer or assistant. I'll be in the stands, it won't be easy, I won't I don't even know how we're going to work again, probably with earpieces, but it will be complicated.”
