St Etienne coach Claude Puel has again admitted how difficult it was to recover from Wesley Fofana's sale last year.

Fofana left ASSE for Leicester City in the final days of the 2020 summer market.

Puel said, “Since my arrival, we have had to face a lot of things. The sporting aspect is closely linked to the economic aspect.

"It was therefore an obligation to open the door immediately to certain young people, to give them play time, to train them, to create assets when needed, to be able to sell them to fill deficits and this is unfortunately what we had to do with Wesley Fofana in the first year.

"He stabilised us and I recall that we were first with three wins and a draw when he was there. It was a big loss for us and we saw the player he was."