The Bastia youth academy is located in the suburbs of Bastia's northern district.
On one hand, this area is closer to the Mediterranean coast, making the land more level; on the other hand, the club lacks money and doesn't have the funds to expand Bastia's first-team training base. Being able to keep the reserve team next to the first team is already quite difficult.
Other youth teams can only be arranged in more distant suburbs.
Châtaigner has even had multiple disputes with owner and president Geronimi over this, and the two have had many discussions.
Châtaigner hopes to increase part of the budget each season for youth development and player training.
However, this obviously pains Geronimi greatly. Youth development is truly money-burning, and you can't see results in the short term. As a businessman, he's naturally reluctant to provide funding.
"Youth development is the root of any team. A team needs stars, but it needs even more young players coming up through the ranks. Any club cannot survive without youth development," Châtaigner said as he led Julien into the youth academy, expressing his philosophy.
Since taking office at Bastia, most of Châtaigner's work has been on first-team transfers and contract renewals, but he also oversees youth development.
Generally speaking, a team would have a dedicated youth development director, but at Bastia, this position is held concurrently by Châtaigner.
Geronimi's explanation is that capable people should do more work, but in reality, it's about saving money wherever possible.
Julien nodded.
He had never been here before. Seeing that some training fields still had artificial turf, he sighed at the difficulties faced by mid-to-lower tier teams.
Not every team can afford top-level training facilities: swimming pools, physiotherapy rooms, gyms, natural grass training fields, and everything else you could want.
More teams, like Bastia, mostly have artificial turf, with only one or two natural grass fields that look like vegetable patches.
Other facilities and equipment are kept to a minimum.
This time Châtaigner asked Julien to become Bastia's youth ambassador. The process wasn't complicated—basically just cooperating with media for photos, saying a few brief words, then interacting with the youth players, and it would be over.
After the local media photo session ended, Julien met all the youth team players below Bastia's reserve team.
There weren't many—players ranging from several years old to teens, about ninety in total.
All were local Bastia children.
Not a single outsider.
After all, no one would send their children to Corsica for youth training when there are better quality training camps on mainland France.
"I know what you're waiting for. I think Coach Tavenot has already told you—yes, the team's youth ambassador, Julien! I don't think I need to introduce him further. Not to waste time, come on, Julien!"
Châtaigner pointed to Julien beside him.
Clap clap clap!
The young players excitedly applauded. This year they had heard too many stories about Julien—from robber to French international, from criminal to Bastia hero.
Many Bastia fans said that De Rocca had already secured his place as a Bastia legend.
The day he leaves Bastia, he will be a legend.
He arrived unknown, he'll leave famous throughout Corsica.
Julien walked somewhat shyly to the front of everyone. He took the microphone, coughed tactically, then said,
"Hello everyone, I'm Julien. Originally, I didn't plan to chat with you about anything. I think football is a very personal thing. It doesn't need others pointing fingers, and it doesn't need others telling us what we should or shouldn't do.
I don't want to lecture you as someone who's been through it all. Because this world has too many people who want to point fingers at others, as if the world would collapse if we don't listen to them.
But it's not like that. Just pursue yourself, and that's enough.
There's nothing in this world that absolutely must be done.
Many people know my present, few know my past, but I have no intention of bringing up those things. I'll just tell you one small story.
When I was seven, I was still playing football on the gravel ground in Fontaine-de-Vaucluse—we called the gravel ground Stade des Murailles (Stadium of Walls), named after a section of medieval wall ruins, but it was actually a gravel field converted from a community garbage dump.
Every time we went on the field, we would tap our toes on the ground because many small stones would get into our shoes and hurt our feet.
When we tapped our toes downward, the stones would come out—because our football boots had many holes worn through by our toes.
You think I'm going to praise suffering?
No, what I want to say is that the gravel ground really hurt our feet, and the boots really wore out fast. If we hadn't had no other entertainment and no other field to choose from, I definitely wouldn't have gone there to play football!
That's what I wanted to say. After all, I said from the beginning that I didn't really want to chat with you about anything.
That's it, everyone keep going."
"Haha!"
The young players below all smiled knowingly, including Châtaigner who also laughed.
Looking at Julien speaking eloquently, Châtaigner gained some new understanding of him.
This young man really was reborn after those twenty-plus days in prison.
After speaking, Julien began taking photos with the players and signing autographs for them.
Seeing De Rocca's meticulous signature work, Châtaigner smiled.
To practice his handwriting well, Julien takes a special French writing class every day after training. In his words, "I don't want to leave my fans with the impression that I'm uneducated."
For Châtaigner, many of Julien's ideas are unique.
Perhaps this is what makes genius different?
When Julien left, he left behind a signed number 29 jersey, hanging on the wall of Bastia's youth academy.
Looking at the distant youth academy and thinking of those children not much younger than himself, he knew that out of these nearly one hundred people, at most ten could enter professional football.
There might not even be one who makes it to a top-league team.
But it's precisely these one hundred, one thousand, ten thousand youth players who can't make it to professional football that provide the base for talented players to emerge.
It's also they who continue to spread the love for football.
They harbor football dreams, try themselves, fail, but then they'll give their own children a chance to try.
They might become amateur players, they might become football professionals.
At worst, they'll sit in the stands every weekend, cheering for their home team.
Cheering and feeling disappointed for a small football team.
This is the meaning of youth development.
Is youth development only worth doing if it definitely produces geniuses?
Thinking of these young players, thinking of youth development, Julien also reflected on his speech.
"Perhaps in the future I could buy a team and run a youth academy?"
This thought suddenly arose in Julien's mind.
But he quickly suppressed it. To accomplish this would require a lot of money.
He'd wait until his professional career earned him enough money.
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