Maxime Bossis

Maxime Bossis

Personal information
Full name	Maxime Bossis
Date of birth	(1955-06-26) June 26, 1955
Place of birth	Saint-André-Treize-Voies, Vendée, France
Height
Position(s)	Full Back
Youth career
1969–1970	Saint-André Sport
1970–1973	FC Yonnais
Senior career*
Years	Team	Apps	(Gls)
1973–1985	Nantes	379	(24)
1985–1989	RC Paris	120	(2)
1990–1991	Nantes	34	(0)
Total		533	(26)
International career‡
1976–1986	France	76	(1)
Managerial career
1996	Saint-Étienne
*Club domestic league appearances and goals, correct as of 2007 ‡ National team caps and goals, correct as of 2007

Maxime Bossis (French pronunciation: ​[maksim bɔsis]; born June 26, 1955 in Saint-André-Treize-Voies, Vendée) is a retired football defender from France, who obtained 76 caps (one goal) for the French national team, won the 1984 European Football Championship and played in two World Cup semi-finals.

Bossis spent most of his career playing for Nantes, a club he helped win three Ligue 1 titles and one Coupe de France.

Football career

A longtime starter for FC Nantes during the club's most successful period during the 1970s and 1980s, Bossis was noted chiefly as a left fullback but filled various roles in defense. Bossis spent much of his time at right back during Nantes' championship-winning seasons in 1977 and 1980, in which Thierry Tusseau normally started on the left, but made the left back position his own beginning in 1981. Bossis helped Nantes to finish first or second in every season between 1976 and 1981. The club added a third title in 1983, finishing ten points ahead of second-place Girondins Bordeaux. In 1985, Bossis moved to the ambitious RC Paris, but the Parisian club achieved only modest success in spite of heavy spending that acquired such players as Enzo Francescoli and Pierre Littbarski. Bossis returned to Nantes for one final season in 1990, lining up next to future French international Marcel Desailly before retiring from play.

Bossis was named Footballer of the Year by France Football in 1979 and 1981.

Bossis also represented France for ten years, appearing at the World Cups of 1978, 1982, and 1986. He is mostly remembered for missing the last penalty in 1982 World Cup semifinal between West Germany and France. While the score was tied at 4-4, Bossis missed the next penalty, allowing Horst Hrubesch to score the last penalty and drive the Germans to the final. From 1985 to 1992, he held the French record of caps, before fellow defender Manuel Amoros established a new mark with 82 caps. He also held the French record of matches played in the FIFA World Cup with 15, subsequently surpassed by Fabien Barthez. Bossis was also in the team that won the European Championship in 1984.

Private and later life

Bossis' younger brother, Joël, also played professional football and holds the all-time record most goals scored for Chamois Niortais.

After he retired in 1991, Bossis briefly embraced a career as a football executive, heading the Coupe de France Central Commission (1993-1995) before he joined Saint-Étienne as sporting director (1996-1997). He then reinvented himself as a TV commentator, working first for TPS, then for Orange Sport and since 2014 for BeIn Sport.

Honours

Club

Nantes

• Ligue 1: 1976-77
• Ligue 1: 1979-80
• Ligue 1: 1982-83
• Coupe de France: 1978-79

International

• UEFA European Football Championship: 1984
• FIFA World Cup: Third-Place 1986
• FIFA World Cup: Fourth-Place 1982

External links

• French Football Federation Profile (French)
• Stats (French)