The meeting between Thouars and Neuville, played this Saturday, November 30 at the Philippe-Morin stadium, was stopped due to fog. At the request of his linesmen who were having difficulty distinguishing the opposite play, the central referee, Romain Lescaudron, interrupted the game after only 14 minutes of play.
According to the rules, he had 45 minutes to make a decision: to restart the game or stop it permanently. After returning to the pitch twice with his assistants, he opted for the second solution. “ It's a reasonable decision. I couldn't see my players on the other side of the field and therefore couldn't coach them. If a team had won 1-0 on a disputed offside due to poor visibility, that would have been a problem. It's better this way. The fog has not lifted. There hasn't really been any progress since this morning.”commented Pierre Naudet, the Thouars coach. “I especially regret that we started the match. It's frustrating. I was happy with what my players offered before the match was stopped”confided Badr El Brahmi, the Neuville coach.
The Thouarsais reservists, traveling to Saint-Savin Saint-Germain in Vienne, suffered the same fate, for the same reasons. However, the meeting did not start. So they made the trip for nothing. Other matches also did not take place like Bressuire (b) – Chasseneuil Saint Georges, in Regional 3. The Thouars-Neuville match is therefore postponed, necessarily in 2025 since Thouars is exempt on December 7, plays on December 14 at Périgny then on December 21 in La Rochelle, in a late match.
