OGC Nice regained their status as a professional club after World War II and were slotted into Ligue 2 before achieving promotion to Ligue 1 in 1948/49. Just two seasons after that, they achieved their first ever honor – champions of Ligue 1 in the 1950/1951 season. With a team featuring French internationals Domingo, Bonfaci, Ben Tifour and Corteaux, along with a pair of Argentines Gonzales and Carniglia plus the Swede Bengtsson, Nice came out of nowhere to take the league – sitting dead bottom of the table after the first 6 matches and only managing to move up to 9th with 13 games left in the season before fighting hard to move into the top spot with just one game to spare. On the final day, Nice defeated Stade Francais 4-0 to end the season level on points with Lille, but their higher goal average meant that they had won the league by the narrowest of margins.

 

It was the beginning of a sensational decade for the club from the French Riviera. The following season, Nice proved it was no fluke by defending their championship and winning the Coupe de France to boot, their first ever double and the first time a team successfully defended their league title in the history of Ligue 1. In the cup final, 5 different players scored for Nice to give them a 5-3 victory over Bordeaux, evidence that the team possessed plenty of fire power. To win the league, Nice had to fend off both Bordeaux and Lille who made life hard for them all season, but they were successful in this endeavor.  

 

When the young and then unknown Juste Fontaine was brought on board in 1954, Nice’s run continued with another Coupe de France victory, a 2-1 win over southern rivals Marseille. That year, they also played in the European Cup for the first time, eventually losing in the quarter finals to the rampaging Real Madrid. The following season, Carniglia retired as a player and moved into the managers role. In his first season in charge, Nice won the league again, fending off Marseille, Monaco, Lens and Saint-Etienne to take the glory.  It was after this that Fontaine left the club to sign with Stade de Reims. He would go on to become an all-time legend of French football and a World Cup hero, but he would never forget his time on the Cote d’Azur with Nice where it all began.

 

Without Fontaine, Nice missed out on the next two league titles but won it a final time in 1959, victorious in 18 out of 19 home games. Two thirds of the side that won this title were graduates of the clubs youth academy set-up, and they also managed to defeat Real Madrid in Nice, but ended up going down to them again after losing the second leg. A few months later, Madrid won their unprecedented fifth European Cup in a row. In subsequent decades, Nice failed to emulate their successes of the 1950’s and they were soon overtaken by the likes of Reims and, later, Saint-Etienne for French football supremacy. Today, Nice’s fans still recall their golden era fondly, and with the club currently doing well in Ligue 1, we may well see them make a comeback.

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Acheivements: 
French Ligue 1 – Champions x4
Coupe de France – Winners x2

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Star player: Luis Carniglia, dob 4 October 1917, pob Olivos, Argentina

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Carniglia used Club Atletico Tigre as a stepping stone towards achieving his childhood dream of playing for Boca Juniors, achieving this goal in 1936. His debut was quite the spectacle with Carniglia scoring just three minutes into the game before he broke his arm in the fifth minute, however Boca went on to win the game 3-0. Carniglia was part of the great Boca squad that won the 1940 Argentine championship and the Copa Dr Carlos Ibarguen. In 1941, Carniglia broke another limb, this time his leg – a major blow for a footballer. It took three years for him to recover, but even then he was never the same player and he could only prolong his career by moving to France and signing with SC Toulon and then OGC Nice. In his final years as a player, Carniglia managed to win the French Ligue 1 title and then the Coupe de France twice. With Nice, he then transitioned into the role of a manager. In this role, he experienced immediate success with Nice winning the league title again. In 1957, he left Nice to take the reigns at Real Madrid. At this time, Madrid were the greatest team the world had ever seen, with players like di Stefano (the Balon D’Or holder), Gento, Kopa and Rial. Puskas joined in 1958 and Carniglia did not have a high opinion of him at first, as he had not played professionally for some time and was quite fat. Carniglia whipped Puskas into shape and he was able to lose 15 kg before his first match against Oviedo. He left Puskas out of the lineup for the 1959 European Cup final, which resulted in him getting the sack from Santiago Bernebeau. With Real, Carniglia won two European Cups and one La Liga title. He floated around the Serie A for a while before joining AS Roma, where he won the 1961 Fairs Cup. Following arguements with club directors, he moved on to AC Milan, the team he had beaten in the 1958 European Cup final. At that time, they were reigning European Cup champions and had qualified for the Intercontinental Cup where they played Pele’s Santos, who lost the first leg. After the game, rumors circulated that the referee had been bribed. Carniglia tried to have him changed for the return leg but was prevented to doing so. With Pele out injured, Santos won the second leg to tie the aggregate score. In the tiebreaker, the referee gave Santos a contentious penalty and showed Cesare Maldini the red card. Santos won the match and the cup. Carniglia retired as a coach and became General Manager of Boca Juniors before becoming president of the Argentine footballers union. He died in 2001 aged 83.