AAJ Blois
The Association Amicale de la Jeunesse de Blois (short form: AAJ Blois ; the name means "Friends of Blois Youth") is a French football club from Blois in central France . Blois has also had a women's football division since the early 1980s .
history
AAJ Blois was founded in 1912. It carried this name unchanged until 1999; This year there was a merger with local rivals US Blois, founded in 1984 , which has since played under the name Blois Football 41 . 41 is the serial number of the Loir-et-Cher department in which Blois is located.
The club colors are red and yellow. Like the AAJB for a time, its successor will also take up the position in the urban Stade des Allées Jean Leroi , which nowadays has a capacity of around 7,000 spectators, and in earlier decades even had space for around 10,000. The league team has also been at home in parts of the Stade de Vienne in the neighboring municipality of Saint-Gervais-la-Forêt on the left bank of the Loire .
League affiliation and achievements
The club has never had professional status and has never played in the top French league , but was represented for nine years (1970-1975 and 1978-1982) in the second division , which was open to both amateur and professional teams during this time . The AAJ achieved their best placements in 1970/71 (as group eight in a league that consisted of three seasons with 16 participants each) and 1980/81 (as group twelfth in a league with two seasons of 18 participants).
In the French Cup competition for the Coupe de France , Blois qualified a total of twelve times for the national main round, for the first time in the 1943/44 season and for the last time (2013) in 2004/05 . The time focus was between the mid-1950s and the early 1970s. In five of these draws, the AAJ or its successor reached the sixteenth finals (1956, 1960, 1965, 1972 - after a 1-0 victory over first division Girondins Bordeaux - and in 2005), and in 1970/71 they even made it to among the eight best teams in France. There it was Olympique Marseille , who with two clear wins (9: 1 and 4: 2) prevented the second division leader AAJ Blois from advancing.
In the 2013/14 season Blois Football 41 competes in the sixth class Division d'Honneur .
Well-known former players and coaches
- René Bihel , AAJ coach twice in the 1950s
- Aly Cissokho , player (as a child and adolescent, 1995-2003)
- Robert Dewilder , trainer 1978–1982
- René Ferrier , from trainer
- Philippe Gondet (as a youth), later a national player
- "Pancho" Gonzalès , coach from 1982
- Ahmed Kantari , Moroccan international (as a youth, until 1999)
- Veronique Romagnoli , during her time at Blois she took part in the European Championship in 1984 with the French women's national team
- Pierre Sbaïz , player 1970–1975
- Bako Touré , player 1971/72
- Claude Trape , deaf and mute goalkeeper in the early 1970s
literature
- Thierry Berthou / Collectif: Dictionnaire historique des clubs de football français. Pages de Foot, Créteil 1999, Volume 1, ISBN 2-913146-01-5
- L'Équipe / Gérard Ejnès: Coupe de France. La folle épopée. L'Équipe, Issy-les-Moulineaux 2007, ISBN 978-2-915-53562-4