PROFILE | Hugo Magnetti and Brest pushing themselves to the limit | OneFootball

Éric Roy has had a transformative impact at Brest since joining the club in January 2023. He has taken the club from a relegation scrap and into the UEFA Champions League, and they are on course for qualification for the next round of the competition.

There hasn’t been great investment in the squad, even despite Champions League football coming to Brest. For Roy, therefore, the emphasis has been on getting the most out of the players that are already there, taking them to the next level. Hugo Magnetti, represents the fruit of Roy’s work, whilst also embodying the principles of intensity and effort that the Brest manager so emphasises.

“When he arrived, he adopted a discourse regarding the players that they were capable of doing much better than they had been doing, and there was an awareness of that,” Le Ty-Zéfs’ sporting director Grégory Lorenzi told Get French Football News in an exclusive interview earlier this year.  “We had a very difficult first half of the season before he arrived, and you see the same players from the start of last season this season too. Almost 90% of the squad is the same! That shows that the quality was there, but Roy has managed to instil a discourse that has allowed the players to be more confident and show what they are capable of on the field […] now, on the pitch, you see players who are liberated and play in a certain way that allows us to get these excellent results,” he added. Those words, perhaps more than any other player in the Brest squad, apply to Magnetti.

Magnetti signs contract extension

The midfielder is a remnant of Brest’s days in Ligue 2. As the club has grown, so has he as he has become a more prominent figure in the midfield. He does the hard yards and isn’t spectacular in any aspect; if there was a ‘steady eddie’ in Ligue 1, it is Magnetti but he is always in sync with his teammates and largely error-free.

It has been an excellent 2024 for the Frenchman, who was rewarded with a new contract that runs through until 2027. He is unlikely to go anywhere any time soon, however. Like many in Les Pirates’ squad, he is not the profile that garners considerable interest, as exemplified by Nantes’ enquiries in the summer, but in this Brest side, he is a crucial part of the squad, especially given the club’s intense calendar this season.

GFFN | Luke Entwistle