Admar Lopes, the new Campos on whom everything rests in the Girondins

• The Girondins de Bordeaux host the PSG this Saturday (9 p.m.) during the 13th day of Ligue 1.

• Appointed technical director of the club last July, Admar Lopes is the architect of Gérard Lopez's project.

• Unparalleled recruiter through Lille and Monaco, the Portuguese trained by the greatest must now prove himself on the front line.

He has crossed paths, and now negotiated, with the greatest leaders or players in the world of football for more than 15 years, Admar Lopes is not the most comfortable man in the world in front of a journalist. "It's a little stressful for me, can I light a cigarette?" », He asks politely before starting to tell himself in this autumnal morning at the castle of Haillan. It must be said that this is the first time in his career, at 37, that he takes so much light - which he "doesn't like very much" - him, the man in the shadows. Until his appointment as technical director of the Girondins de Bordeaux, last July on the occasion of the acquisition of the club by Gérard Lopez, the Portuguese considered one of the best recruiters in the world was happy to hide behind his bosses,Antero Henrique at FC Porto then Luis Campos at AS Monaco and Losc. There was no risk of seeing him!

But his turn has arrived. The child of Ermesinde, a small town located 16 km north-east of Porto, is today (finally) on the front line. A logical continuation for this football enthusiast. “As a child, it was his only hobby, remembers his little sister Tatiana, he played all day in the street, he collected images… We watched the matches together, we also played a lot of video games, in particular at 

.

We could spend hidden nights to play.

We also did questionnaires on the clubs and the players at the table.

In short, we lived 24 hours football at home.

The main person concerned remembers especially the time when at 6-7 years old he preferred "to buy sports newspapers rather than chewing gum or candy with his pocket money", which "his parents could not find. normal at that age (smiles) ”.

Our Girondins de Bordeaux dossier

The Mourinho "boom"

Of course, he hits the ball.

In a club in his city before quickly taking the direction of the training center of Rio Ave (first division club).

But very quickly, the young defensive midfielder realizes that he will not make a career (he will play until the Portuguese third division): “From the age of 15, I started to think about how to work in football professional.

I went to university to become a sports teacher [he has a master's degree in High Performance training].

At that time, it was the Mourinho boom [winner of the 2003 UEFA Cup and 2004 Champions League with Porto].

" He adds :

“We all wanted to become like him!

Mourinho had gone through university to be a physical education teacher early in his career.

"

At the same time, Admar Lopes passed his UEFA diplomas to train (he had a certificate to coach until the second division in Portugal) and quickly became an educator at the Boavista club. He will spend four years there.

But at 23, his life changed for the first time. The one who is described by his sister as "a good, very sociable and charismatic student with leadership qualities" obtains, thanks to one of his teachers, an internship with the Dragons. A dream for this FC Porto supporter. The young man then seizes his chance with the nerve and the club decides to integrate him into its recruitment unit for his academy. “He quickly stood out for his capacity for work and, above all, for the quality with which the information reached me [on the players]. Over time, he gained notoriety and he quickly had my complete confidence, ”explains his first boss, Joao Luis Afonso, former“ analyst ”of the Dragons and PSG, who became a very close friend of Admar Lopes. Everything accelerates then.

“After a year and a half [at the academy], I joined the cell of the first team.

Antero Henrique [the sports director] was looking for a younger profile with a different vision than the old ones.

I started to travel, a lot in South America and a little in Africa.

After two or three years, I became the coordinator of the whole cell, ”he explains.

And the Portuguese made his first big shots: James Rodriguez, Jackson Martins, Danilo (the Brazilian) or Alex Sandro.

With the passing, a second UEFA Cup for FC Porto in 2011.

The linchpin of Campos

There he learns the ropes of trading: "Buy cheap, value the player and sell at a high price." Our main target is 16-23 year olds. Ideally, we like to follow them for three years before starting or not. “But to take a new step, we might as well work with the best in the field, a certain Luis Campos. After a first invitation for a project at Real Madrid (finally abandoned), Admar Lopes goes to the Rock to join the new technical director of AS Monaco. He becomes his right arm. At the time, the two men were already relying on top-of-the-range software to research and monitor potential recruits. There are failures but also many successes: Bernardo Silva, Bakayoko, Rony Lopes, Fabinho, Lemar… And above all, the results follow. Bis repetita from 2017 in Losc (Pépé, Ikoné,Bamba, Osimhem, David, Botman, etc.). Today, the Bordeaux leader is full of praise for his mentor: “Luis is a visionary. He is able to spot a player by seeing him just once or twice for 15-20 minutes. He also has an incredible relationship with the players and coaches. "

But the one who watches a good fifteen games a week, plus all the videos of players edited by his team of recruiters, is not for nothing either.

Joao Luis Afonso:

“Admar is a great analyst.

He has an extraordinary ability to interpret, compare and project the player.

He has a vast knowledge of the markets and his instinct is often very good.

He is a loyal, corporate, very proactive and autonomous person with a great ability to step out of his comfort zones.

Well, he can be very stubborn (smiles).

"

Tatiana emphasizes her brother's personality: “I think he owes his success to his perseverance and his passion for football. He is confident in his methods and he can also be very influential. Admar is completely devoted to his profession and, this is perhaps his biggest flaw because he is unable to cut for a second! “Between two explanations on

the recruitment agency that he developed with Luis Campos and Gérard Lopez, the father of a little girl admits, moreover, after four months, that he has not yet taken the time to discover Bordeaux and its vineyards. It must be said that he has so much to do to put the Girondins back in working order. Build an efficient team and quickly modernize the very aging Haillan training center. Its two priorities.

“I don't want to be an office sports director!

"

This challenge, to be number 1, he "has been preparing for four or five years with Luis (Campos) and Gérard (Lopez) because it was planned that I take the reins.

"And even if for the first time in his life, he is" more autonomous ", Admar Lopes does not intend to revolutionize the planet.

The method has proven itself.

So much so that in certain aspects, he looks like his mentor like two drops with 20 years younger.

Polyglot - he speaks perfectly the French he learned during three years at school - the Portuguese cultivates his discretion like Luis Campos.

He does not consider that his function needs to be exposed in the media:

“I adapt, I'm not a very media-oriented person, I don't really like light, but I understand that in a project like that, I sometimes have to speak up.

"

In Bordeaux, he is the thinking head of the sports project.

Often present at training, close to the players, the thirty-something occupies the field: “I don't want to be an office sports director!

"Able to give and / or translate instructions in the locker room before a match, he has" very good interpersonal skills "for Ricardo Mangas.

“He is demanding because he wants results, continues the defender, but sometimes he is able to joke with us and laugh, he is a good person.

At the same time, he wasn't going to say the opposite of his boss.

But even if you dig a little deeper, it's hard to find someone to speak badly about Admar Lopes. “He is a person who respects the hierarchy a lot, says a French agent, he is very transparent in the negotiations, he always puts sports performance as the first criterion, but people are also very important to him. He asks a lot of questions about it. I know others who don't bother with it. He really does it on a case-by-case basis. "He does not have, for the moment, the reputation of certain Portuguese leaders:" With us, he is considered as the little protégé of Luis Campos but it is true that he is a hard worker. Now as a sporting director we have to wait and see what he's capable of,but he is one of the people people respect in the football world, ”admits an influential Portuguese agent. It's up to Admar Lopes to make sure that doesn't change.

Sport

Bordeaux-Reims: What's the problem with Fransergio in the Girondins?

Sport

Girondins de Bordeaux: "1000% confidence in Vladimir Petkovic", says Admar Lopes despite poor results

• Aquitaine

• Sport

• Bordeaux

• Soccer

• Girondins of Bordeaux

• League 1