50 years of MHSC: “Roger Milla, we had to put up with him! Sometimes, Michel (Mézy) had to stop training because the players were beating each other up”

Cameroonian Roger Milla, an outstanding personality in the world of football.

Condensing half a century of history into 84 pages. This is the challenge taken up by the sports editorial team of Midi Libre in this special edition on the 50th anniversary of the MHSC. Available on newsstands on December 11 for only 5 euros, this glossy magazine will make you relive the great moments in the history of the Montpellier club through our “50” who made the MHSC. Builders, obviously, starting with this “Nicollin Saga”, told by Laurent and Colette, the wife of the late Loulou, but also Georges Frêche, the mayor who became a friend, or the essential Bernard Gasset, co-founder of the club.

This Saturday: For three years (1986-1989), the Indomitable Lions striker Roger Milla was one of the main architects of the club's rise to the first division. With character and determination.

A star, a real one, temperamental at times. What a character, the Cameroonian striker Roger Milla, who drove many defenders, including his teammates, crazy. “We had to put up with him!” confides Laurent Nicollin. Sometimes, it was tense, Michel (Mézy) had to stop training because the players were beating each other up. Between him and (Franck) Lucchesi, it was a bit complicated.”Tough exchanges confirmed by the other full-back, Pascal Baills: “Roger had won the Coupe de France with Bastia, he arrived with a status. As soon as he arrived, he had a unique season and helped us move up to D1 by scoring 18 goals. But it's true that Franck and I liked to tease him…”

At 35 years old, Roger Milla was much more than an indomitable. “He was a goalscorer, a feline. Roger is a great player who arrived with us in the second division. But it was in Montpellier that he made money. On his contract, he put the salary that corresponded to the value he had.” And Loulou, who had Chimène's eyes for his “stars”, did not regret it. Thanks to him and his instinctive sense of goal, the MPSC of the time was able to climb the ladder, even if his last season, in 1988-1989, was more complicated, due to his age.

An exceptional 1990 World Cup

No one suspected then that at 38 years old the old lion would roar even louder with Cameroon (102 caps, 28 goals) during the 1990 World Cup in Italy, during which he scored five goals until the quarter-finals, a first for an African nation. An apotheosis celebrated at each achievement by a Makossa (dance) in front of the corner flag, an image that will remain in the memories. “I was happy for him, because he was very endearing. He made us all vibrate”, greets Laurent Nicollin, whose bond with the player has never been broken.

Also very attached to Montpellier, Roger Milla (72 years old), who has since returned to Cameroon, has formed a partnership between a local club and the MHSC. Hoping perhaps to one day find his successor there. But there is only one Roger Milla, the only one.

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