Hotty Toddy from Bordeaux and the French outpost of Ole Miss fans

The timepiece ticks toward midnight successful a quiescent suburb extracurricular the French metropolis of Bordeaux. Valentin Joanny sits perched connected the borderline of his couch, screaming astir playcalling and the Ole Miss Rebels.

Joanny, 4,500 miles and a fewer clip zones from SEC country, is sitting successful his one-bedroom apartment, which looks little similar a French workplace and much similar a dorm country successful Oxford, Mississippi. There is simply a ample bluish Ole Miss emblem hanging supra the couch, portion a jersey that erstwhile wideout Elijah Moore wore successful signifier rests nearby.

And Joanny is getting loud.

There is simply a small much than 8 minutes to play successful the 4th quarter. The Rebels, ranked No. 11 successful the College Football Playoff rankings, request to triumph against the No. 9 Alabama Crimson Tide to support their chances of winning the SEC West part alive. The Rebels' lone nonaccomplishment frankincense acold successful the play came to the LSU Tigers. Ole Miss needs to triumph the remainder of its league games and person LSU suffer 1 much successful bid to look the No. 1 Georgia Bulldogs successful the SEC rubric game.

Joanny can't support quiescent due to the fact that the Rebels are successful the midst of surrendering a 10-point first-half pb to the Crimson Tide. While the Crimson Tide person forced 2 punts and a turnover connected downs successful the Rebels' past 3 possessions, the refs are drafting astir of his ire. Ole Miss manager Lane Kiffin is besides getting his stock of the disapproval coming retired of Joanny's apartment, and connected his Twitter feed. Joanny is frightened Kiffin is trying to out-coach Tide manager Nick Saban and wantonness what Joanny believed had worked frankincense far.

"Utilise les surface sur Watkins ils ne les défendent pas!" Joanny screams implicit a FaceTime telephone with ESPN, calling for much screens for wide receiver Jordan Watkins.

Sports fandom has ne'er cared for nationalist borders oregon authorities lines, and Joanny is determined to beryllium it. He is the European outpost for Ole Miss, and the biggest Rebels protagonist connected the different broadside of the pond, moving a Twitter relationship called "Ole Miss France" with astir 3,000 followers, mostly tweeting French-language shot and hoops content.

Kiffin is among the Twitter followers, adjacent retweeting thing implicit the summer, but close present Joanny would similar the manager conscionable instrumentality with the crippled program and tally the shot with Quinshon Judkins.

"Joué simple, fait courir Judkins!" he screams, which translates to: "Play it simple, and fto Judkins run!"

Joanny's travel with Ole Miss began during a crippled against Alabama successful 2014. The 29-year-old canine trainer was a casual instrumentality of assemblage football, and had precocious watched the 2006 movie, "The Blind Side." He was fascinated by Michael Oher's determination to prime betwixt Ole Miss and Tennessee, and decided to tune into Ole Miss' crippled the pursuing weekend.

It was against Alabama, and helium was successful awe of what came next: A 23-17 triumph implicit the No. 1-ranked Crimson Tide -- Ole Miss' archetypal triumph implicit a top-ranked squad successful programme history, and 1 of the all-time large days astatine Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. Joanny watched arsenic fans brought down the goalposts aft the crippled and carried them done The Grove.

"I don't similar the large teams," Joanny said. "I similar the teams who tin person trouble, truthful I deliberation I admit myself successful Ole Miss, an underdog each year."

Joanny was hooked. He present bleeds reddish and navy blue, and keeps up with Ole Miss sports arsenic overmuch arsenic anyone successful Mississippi. He stays awake for Rebels shot successful the fall, and tunes into hoops successful the spring. He follows it all. Last season, Rebels shot kept him up until 7 a.m. successful France connected their tally to the College World Series championship.

"From 6 p.m. to 5 a.m. it's lone assemblage football," Joanny said. "I don't attraction astir going retired with friends. From September to February, weekends are for football."

Besides watching Ole Miss, helium uses 2 screens to drawback the remainder of the enactment connected a Saturday. Joanny said helium watches astir 70% of each different assemblage shot games -- mostly done 40-minute extended item videos connected YouTube.

Those games tin besides beryllium recovered unrecorded connected ESPN Player -- a subscription work to ticker NCAA sports extracurricular the United States -- but sometimes helium has different means. Until past June, Joanny lived successful Paris, and sometimes helium would enlistee immoderate friends to spell to The Moose -- an aged Canadian barroom and grill successful the city's 6th Arrondissement. There, a friend, James, who bartends, made definite to spot them connected the champion array with a premier spot for a TV and immoderate assemblage crippled they wanted. No 1 other ever kicked up a fuss, either. They were conscionable near alone, a radical of French guys reveling successful hours of football.

In his 8 years of watching assemblage football, Joanny has helped foster a beardown community. He and his friends person a podcast unneurotic talking astir assemblage football. They're a premix of Notre Dame Fighting Irish, Oklahoma State Cowboys, Florida Gators and Oregon Ducks fans. They sometimes tally Twitch streams successful which they commentate connected games. Joanny adjacent scouts players.

"When I americium reasoning astir this it's crazy," helium said. "To person the clip and passionateness to scout a batch of players, it's similar [the sports networks]. We bash the aforesaid work, but conscionable for a small French shot community. It's not to marque money, conscionable for america to stock and effort to grow the assemblage shot assemblage successful France.

"I deliberation we're doing good due to the fact that determination are a batch much French accounts astir assemblage teams and a batch of radical who are asking astir the games."

By the extremity of past season, Joanny's Twitter pursuing had amassed a fewer 100 followers, but arsenic the property of his fandom crept toward a decade, helium had inactive ne'er seen the Rebels play successful person. When a chap instrumentality suggested helium alert to New Orleans for the Sugar Bowl against the Baylor Bears, helium said helium could not spend to, and resisted suggestions to crowdfund for the money. It would beryllium incorrect to inquire others to help, helium thought. But the impulse to get determination by immoderate means indispensable was excessively beardown to deny.

"One day, I said, 'F--- it, I person thing to lose.' So I tried," Joanny said. "I had astir 400 followers. It was 4 a.m. I started the GoFundMe. When I woke up, I had raised implicit $1,000. I was like, 'Woah, who are each these people?'"

Within hours that morning, helium had raised $2,000, mostly from American Ole Miss fans.

"A batch of radical were sharing my tweet and pursuing me," Joanny said. "I was thinking, 'You don't cognize me, you ne'er spot my face, I tin instrumentality the wealth and adjacent the relationship and goodbye.' It was crazy. I americium truthful thankful for these radical due to the fact that they gave maine a batch of wealth and their trust. It was the champion acquisition of my life."

That it was. On the formation to New Orleans, a subordinate of the Ole Miss Alumni Association got successful interaction to inquire if helium wanted to beryllium successful the suite with them for the game, and gave him the Elijah Moore jersey and publication astir Oxford. He is readying to instrumentality to the U.S. adjacent November, this clip to Oxford. He hasn't booked his flights conscionable yet. He's waiting for the 2024 NCAA hoops docket to beryllium released truthful helium tin drawback a hoops crippled connected the aforesaid play arsenic a shot game.

On his archetypal travel to a game, helium met galore of the fans who donated and followed his sum connected Twitter. He made definite to instrumentality the shouts of "Hotty Toddy" whenever helium heard them -- though it's overmuch harder to accidental successful a French accent.

Joanny has his ain pregame routine.

With a prime-time (in France) crippled against a rival, helium settled successful with a classical pregame meal: KFC. Usually helium has immoderate beers arsenic well, arsenic if tailgating successful The Grove could beryllium recreated successful an flat successful southwestern France, if lone you get the essentials right.

Saturday's crippled with Alabama astir seemed similar a full-circle moment. The Rebels haven't defeated the Tide since 2015. To Joanny, this seemed different. The Rebels were 8-1 heading into the game, portion Saban was reeling from a decision to LSU, the Tide's 2nd of the season.

Joanny, similar immoderate seasoned fan, refused to get his hopes up, adjacent arsenic Ole Miss took a 17-14 pb into halftime. Judkins was moving good and had the Rebels' 2 touchdowns.

The full clip helium was firing disconnected tweets. He joined a chorus of Ole Miss fans connected societal media, aggravated astatine the refs for what they thought should person been a roughing the passer punishment precocious successful the game.

"Every clip against Alabama! E V E R Y T I M E!"

J'ai vraiment la haine là, entre les refs qui ne voient rien quand c'est determination nous et les choix d'appels de jeu à la fin du thrust ..
J'ai vraiment le seum. https://t.co/Djc6nHsBI6

One idiosyncratic punctuation tweeted him: "He is seeing this each the mode successful France!!!"

As clip ticked toward 1 a.m. successful France, Joanny could spot the crippled slipping away.

Alabama, with 3 touchdowns from backmost Bryce Young, had engineered a comeback, leaving the Rebels down 30-24 entering the last 2 minutes. Joanny leaned guardant and clung to each moment. A 35-yard tally from Judkins enactment them heavy into Bama's territory, and Judkins produced again with a 14-yard tally to enactment Ole Miss into the reddish zone.

"JUDKINS 4 HEISMAN," Joanny tweeted.

But it was not to be, his shouts and screams went unheard. Ole Miss didn't propulsion anymore screens, and the last 4 downs didn't see a Judkins run. Instead, the crippled flamed retired with 2 incomplete passes and a sack. Twitter heard his displeasure again, and however helium was "sick astatine the refs" portion utilizing the connection "voler," which is French for "robbed."

He went extracurricular to locomotion his dog, wherever his neighbour told him helium could perceive his shouting from adjacent door.

Joanny stewed a small longer, tweeting "I'm inactive truly huffy tbh" astatine 1:25 a.m. But erstwhile helium returned from his walk, helium kicked backmost successful beforehand of his TV again. There was much shot to watch.