Henri Bard

Henri Bard (born April 29, 1892 in Lyon , † January 26, 1951 ) was a French football player and architect.

The club career

Before the First World War , Henri Bard moved with his parents to Switzerland and made his first footballing steps with Servette Genève . From 1911, the half-left played in the French capital for the Racing Club de France . The traditional club did not win any titles, but was one of the popular Paris clubs in the childhood years of "Fußlümmelei" , and the technically skilled striker was able to attract attention early on: in early 1913, at the age of 20, he was appointed to the national team for the first time . The war also interrupted his sporting career; like so many young men, Henri Bard must have become a soldier. He may have played for the CASG Paris "bankers" from 1916 to 1917 .

In any case, in the spring of 1918 his name appears in the few surviving team line-ups of FC Lyon : with this club from his birthplace, Bard reached the final of the very first national cup competition , the Coupe Charles Simon , in which Olympique Pantin retained the upper hand 3-0. 1918 or 1919, he continued his career back in Paris, now the Cercle Athlétique , fort, was 1919 again national team and won in the season 1919/20 his only major title he led CAP not only to the final of the now Coupe de France called Cup, but he made up for the 0-1 deficit in a gripping match against Le Havre AC in the first half with a penalty and also scored the goal to make it 2-1 after the break.

From 1922 to 1925 he played again for the Racing Club, was part of the club and national team, but was unable to win a title because there was an official national championship only with the introduction of professionalism (1932/33) and in the cup competition of local rivals Red Star Olympique was insurmountable in the early 1920s .

Similar to Eugène Maës , Bard was also able to transform his name for a sports shoe into sounding money during his active time - quite lucrative for himself, but an "unheard of process" at a time when the advocates of pure amateurism were still on the other side of the Rhine everywhere and especially in the sports associations.

Player stations

• Servette de Genève (until 1911, as a teenager)
• Racing Club de France (1911–1916?)
• (Club Athlétique de la Société Générale Paris, possibly 1916/17)
• FC Lyon (1918)
• Cercle Athlétique Paris (1918? –1922)
• Racing Club de France (1922-1925)

The national player

Between February 1913 and October 1923, Henri Bard played 18 international matches (8 when he was with Racing, 10 with CAP) for the Équipe tricolore , scoring six goals; in four encounters he was also the team captain. There was a little more than five years between his third and fourth international match, as happened to many athletes of his age due to the war.

Two of these encounters were not only among the highlights of his career, but are still considered to be early milestones in French football history: at the football tournament of the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp , the Bleus achieved their first victory over Italy in the quarter-finals ; Henri Bard contributed a hit to this 3-1. It would then take almost 62 years until the next French victory in this duel between two "blues". The other highlight was the first victory against the "teacher" on May 5, 1921, exactly on the hundredth anniversary of Napoléon's death . Bard did not score and England only played with an amateur team, but such games can make a team and its players a legend in the eyes of the nation.

The attack in the formation Dewaquez - Boyer or Darques - P. Nicolas - Bard - Dubly was almost a bank for five years and was one of the best French assault series of the interwar period.

Palmarès

• French cup winner : 1920 (and finalist 1918)
• 18 international matches, 6 goals
• Olympic participant 1920