Jean-Pierre Escalettes appears confused. Perhaps Ray-Ray has hypnotized him yet again.

To my great dismay, the French Football Federation has decided that Raymond Domenech will continue to coach Les Bleus all the way to South Africa. I struggled for a long time with deciding whether this makes him a cat with 9 lives or one of the undead, but considering how much he frightens me I went with the latter. Just a few days ago we told you how FFF member Guy Chambily had called for Domenech to be removed from his position. Although he argued that most of the board members felt the same way, he noted (correctly, as it turns out) that they were probably going to give in (keep your surrender jokes to yourselves, please) and allow Nosferatu Raymond to keep his job.

So, Mr. Chambily got what he wanted…sort of. After  a 90-minute debate, the FFF board agreed (with one exception; no points for guessing who it was) to not open a debate on whether or not to retain Domenech (English version of events here). Basically, the board allowed Guy Chambily to make his point and then spent 90 minutes telling him that he was wasting their time with his calls for Raymond’s head. This is known as irony. Although, to be fair, 90 minutes of actual discussion regarding the firing of the gaffer would have been an equal waste of time since I am fairly certain that Domenech has pictures of Escalettes with either a live boy or a dead girl.

Escalettes has responded to all calls for the firing with a steadfast refusal, even going so far as to engineer two separate votes of confidence (most recently in October). He has argued that removing Domenech at this point would be counter-productive, noting that “since our aim must be to prepare the France team for the World Cup, it would have been hardly in accordance with the line of conduct of the board who have twice confirmed Raymond Domenech as coach. He had to qualify Les Bleus for the World Cup and that’s what he did. We’re qualified and that was the only sportive clause that figured in his contract.” However, the hilarity continued with his next quote: “[A change] would have been difficult to accept for the players, who would have felt betrayed.”

Yes, the players are clearly all on Raymond’s side and wish him to be their coach in perpetuity (which, given that he is undead, is a distinct possibility). Sigh.