The aftermath of the end of the 2016-2017 season was more than tough for the Corsican club. Already relegated after a breathtaking end of the season where Bastia failed to save itself for 3 small points, the club was administratively relegated to the National following its poor economic health which did not allow it to present the necessary guarantees to play in Ligue 2. The club was stripped of its professional status on August 1, 2017. Three days later the leaders let it be known that the club could file for bankruptcy and this time descend to National 3, the fifth French division, or even worse. While the specter of Regional 2 looms, ten buyers come forward to prevent the club from disappearing completely. They will ultimately only be two, accompanied by coach Stéphane Rossi, to take over a club at thefinancial agony.
To discover
League 2 fixtures and results
A lift like no other
The "SCB" finally made its debut in National 3 on August 17, 2017 and managed to bounce back quickly. First measure: re-found the club by partially adopting a fairly common strategy in Spain, namely the model of the Company of Collective Interest (SCIC) better known under the name of "socios". Since 2017, supporters have held 20% of the club, allowing them to have a say in decisions while allowing, thanks to the annual contributions of members to raise 1.2 million euros more than welcome. They have also grouped together under the organization Socios étoiles club bastiais. The rest of the club has been led by President Claude Ferrandi since this terrible descent in 2017. To see if the model can be perpetuated in the elite in the face of much larger budgets.
Ligue 2 while waiting for better?
Good stories are often accompanied by little nudges from fate and the Bastia epic is no exception since the long interruption of competitions due to the health crisis allowed SC Bastia to climb at the same time as Sedan in National at the off-season 2020 on an exceptional basis.
A situation that made a lot of talk following the tense meeting between the two former residents of Ligue 1 who had also broken the attendance record for a fourth division match in France.
Even if the crisis has also had a great impact on the club, the
"Lioni di Furiani"
were able to resume their march forward towards their return to the elite. Only one member of the team descended in 2017 is still present: Gilles Cioni. Today in the Bastia management, the ex-side has become the symbol of this Bastia resilience which was able to return very quickly after an incident which would have sunk more than one club. If the announced objective is to maintain Ligue 2 according to its president, SC Bastia can continue to dream of elite strong supporters who are more than ever part of the history of this local legend.
