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René Ressejac-Duparc

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René Ressejac-Duparc
The French team at the 1900 Olympics
Personal information
Full name René Ressejac-Duparc
Date of birth (1880-09-28)28 September 1880
Place of birth Suresnes, Paris, France
Date of death 19 April 1941(1941-04-19) (aged 60)
Place of death Pornic, France
Height 1,65 m[1]
Position(s) Midfielder
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
–1898 Puteaux Sports Union
1898–1901 Club Français
International career
1900 France MNT 2 (0+)
Medal record
Men's football
Representing  France
Football at the Summer Olympics
Silver medal – second place 1900 Paris Team Competition
*Club domestic league appearances and goals

René Ressejac-Duparc (28 September 1880 – 19 April 1941) was a French footballer who played as a midfielder and who competed in the 1900 Olympic Games, winning a silver medal as a member of the USFSA team, which was primarily Club Français players.[2][3] With Club Français, he reached the finals of the 1900 Challenge International du Nord, and the 1899 and 1900 Championnat de Paris [fr], and won the Coupe Manier three consecutive times at the turn of the century between 1899 and 1901.[3]

Early and personal life

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René Ressejac-Duparc was born in 1880, lived in Puteaux, and was employed at the Banque de France.[3] He had connections to Loire-Atlantique through his mother (originally from Châteaubriant), as well as a home in Pornic, where he died on 19 April 1941, at the age of 60. Biographer Stéphane Gachet suggested Duparc was in Pornic "perhaps to take refuge during the war".[3]

Duparc remained practically unknown and of uncertain identity for several decades since he was only cited in the database of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as a "medalist for France in football" in 1900,[3] with no first name and no other information published about this Olympic footballer until the December 2023 book "All the French medalists from 1896 to the present".[3][4] The biography in the book was compiled from research by Stéphane Gachet, who investigated unknown French Olympians ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics,[3] and who found genealogical records matching the footballer to René Ressejac-Duparc.[3] Gachet then contacted his grandson, Patrick Ressejac-Duparc, who lived in Portugal with his wife, to tell him that his grandfather was an Olympic medalist.[3][4]

Playing career

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Club career

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Duparc began his career playing at U.S. Puteaux before joining Club Français when he was eighteen, in 1898. His mentor was said to be Club Français midfielder Alfred Bloch.[5] On 29 April 1900, Club Français faced Le Havre AC in the final of the 1900 Challenge International du Nord at Tourcoing, which ended in a 2–3 loss.[6] A match summary in L'Auto of a 16 October 1900 game wrote that he was a change to the team's midfield, but as "a good player who knows his job", it marked an improvement.[7]

Duparc continued in the midfield when the team began competing in the Paris championship, the top-level division tournament, later that month,[8][9] playing in all but one match (during which his absence, despite replacement, was noted).[10] The team confidently won all their games.[11][12][13] Continuing to see success in the tournament, L'Auto noted that Duparc was one of the youngest players on the team and that he showed a lot of promise but was already "a good player, very resistant, very tough".[5] He played in the final against Standard Athletic Club, but was injured in the first half as the match ended in a 1–1 draw.[14]

Duparc was also in the winning Club Français line-up, playing in each match, for the 1900 Coupe Manier, which took place later in December.[15][16][17] After winning the Coupe Manier, Club Français's first (including Duparc) and second teams played international friendlies against Croydon and their reserves.[18] Duparc's performance in this match was praised, with his intelligent ball-passing in the first half said to break up Croydon attacks and his "beautiful" passes to the team's forwards in the second half often drawing applause; it ended in a 3–3 draw.[19]

On 6 January 1901, Club Français faced Standard Athletic Club again, this time in the preliminary rounds of the 1901 Challenge International du Nord, which ended in a 0–1 loss.[20] With the referee getting lost in the game, the play turned brutal, mostly perpetrated by Standard Athletic Club, who targeted the Club Français midfielders; Bloch was kicked so hard in the stomach that he had to go off, while Duparc along with Louis Bach and Cuny were "badly hit". Club Français wrote a letter of complaint to the football association.[21] Duparc's misfortune continued; when travelling to compete in another match in January 1901, a group called la bande noire burgled him, taking his shoes and bag.[22]

In the 1901 Championnat de Paris, Duparc began playing as a forward again, still with Club Français.[23]

International career

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Duparc was listed as a forward for the USFSA (French amateur) team, composed mostly of Club Français players, at the 1900 Olympic Games.[24] He was not selected for the opening match against Upton Park on 20 September, which ended in a humiliating 0–4 loss, so Duparc was then picked up for the second match three days later, helping his side to a 6–2 victory over Belgium, which was mostly made up of students from the French-speaking Université libre de Bruxelles; the authors of four of these goals are unknown, so Duparc, who started as a forward alongside teammates Georges Garnier and Gaston Peltier, might have scored at least one of them.[25][26] The French team came second and Duparc was thus awarded with a silver medal.[2]

Honours

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Club

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Club Français

International

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France MNT

References

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  1. ^ "Ressejac Duparc, René, Matricule 1998". archives.paris.fr (in French). Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  2. ^ a b "R. Duparc". Olympedia. Archived from the original on 17 December 2023. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i "Qui est René Duparc, footballeur médaillé aux Jeux olympiques en 1900 et décédé à Pornic?" [Who is René Duparc, footballer who won a medal at the Olympic Games in 1900 and died in Pornic?]. actu.fr (in French). 23 January 2024. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  4. ^ a b "Patrick Ressejac a appris récemment que son grand-père, mort à Pornic, était médaillé aux JO de 1900" [Patrick Ressejac recently learned that his grandfather, who died in Pornic, was a medalist at the 1900 Olympic Games]. www.ouest-france.fr (in French). 1 December 2023. Archived from the original on 18 December 2023. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  5. ^ a b "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 6 December 1900. p. 3, column 3. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  6. ^ "1900 Challenge International du Nord". RSSSF. 19 June 2009. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  7. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 16 October 1900. p. 2, column 3. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  8. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 26 October 1900. p. 2, column 1. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  9. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 28 October 1900. p. 2, columns 2–3. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  10. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 12 November 1900. p. 3, column 1. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  11. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 29 October 1900. p. 2, columns 2–3. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  12. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 5 November 1900. p. 2, column 2. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  13. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 19 November 1900. p. 3, column 1. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  14. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 10 December 1900. p. 3, columns 1–3. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  15. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 14 December 1900. p. 3, column 2. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  16. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 21 December 1900. p. 3, column 1. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  17. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 24 December 1900. p. 3, column 4. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  18. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 28 December 1900. p. 3, column 3. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  19. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 31 December 1900. p. 3, columns 3–5. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  20. ^ "1901 Challenge International du Nord". RSSSF. 19 June 2009. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  21. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 7 January 1901. p. 3, columns 4–5. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  22. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 15 January 1901. p. 3, column 1. Archived from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  23. ^ "Les Sports Athlétiques". L'Auto. 8 February 1901. p. 3, column 1. Archived from the original on 6 January 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  24. ^ "The Other Upton Park – The Forgotten Olympic Champions" (PDF). isoh.org. International Society of Olympic Historians. pp. 29–35. Archived (PDF) from the original on 19 March 2024. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  25. ^ "Games of the II. Olympiad". RSSSF. 12 May 2022. Archived from the original on 9 July 2022. Retrieved 18 March 2024.
  26. ^ "1900 - Paris". Archived from the original on 22 February 2012. Retrieved 18 March 2024.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
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