René Camard

At the time, Red Star played in the second division of the USFSA Paris championship, but his growing fame had earned him requests from several first division clubs, which attempting to attract him in exchange for benefits (in kind or in cash), the beginnings of a professionalism already developed in England, but still rejected with horror in France, so when Camard's hesitation became public knowledge, he was briefly criticized of selling his services to the highest bidder by Ernest Weber, the star football journalist of L'Auto (the future L'Équipe). In the end, he joined the ranks of AS Française. Camard helped AS Française win the 1908 Coupe Manier, which was awarded to the team composed of at least eight French players with the highest ranking in the USFSA Paris championship. On 18 April 1909, Camard started in the final of the Coupe Dewar in 1909 at Stade de Charentonneau, which ended in a 5–0 loss to Gallia Club. On 5 March 1911, he played an international match against English club Weybridge, in which he started a counter-attack that resulted in his side's opening goal in an eventual 4–1 win. In the late 1900s, Camard was called up to do his military service in the 129th Infantry Regiment of Le Havre, and on 9 January 1910, the football team of the 129th Regiment faced the 39th Regiment of Rouen in the opening match of the 1910 USFSA Military Championship, and Camard, then a corporal, assisted two goals to Rémy in an eventual 4–0 win. During the final of the 3rd Army…

On 21 April 1907, shortly after his move to AS Française, the 20-year-old Camard earned his first and last international cap in a friendly match against Belgium at Uccle, playing the game as a left winger, and helping André François to score the winning goal by pushing, with the help of fellow one-time international Georges Bon, the Belgian goalkeeper Robert Hustin into his goal. From 1907 onwards, Camard was regularly selected for the Paris football team against the Nord (1911 and 1913), London XI (1910 and 1912), and the English Wanderers (1913), but for the four France matches in 1908, it was Gabriel Hanot who was preferred to him in a time when the French team was mainly made up of northerners, since the head coach André Billy was from the North. Either way, the USFSA selected him for the would-be France C squad that was originally listed to compete in the football tournament of the 1908 Olympic Games in London, but he ended up not traveling there because the USFSA decided to send only two instead of three teams. On 18 March 1909, he played an unofficial match between USFSA's France and AFA's England, replacing Hanot, who forfeited, but neither he nor France's other winger Robert Eucher were able cross the line of the English backs as France lost 8–0. In the 1911 Paris-Nord meeting, an annual test match for the French national team, he scored a left-footed shot from 15 meters in a 3–1 loss.

René Camard was born in the 7th arrondissement of Paris on 8 February 1887, as the son of Jean-Baptiste (1857–1912) and Elisabeth Marie Lasserre. He quickly devoted himself to sports, excelling in several of them, such as running, shooting, athletic competitions, swimming, cycling, Basque pelota, and especially football, becoming a member of Red Star FC in 1903, aged 16. However, he did not neglect his studies, obtaining his primary school certificate, a certificate of studies from the teachers' association, and a diploma from the Voltaire college in Paris.

Outside of football, Camard was a sales representative, and on 29 March 1913, he married Inès Moreau at the town hall of the 9th arrondissement of Paris. When the First World War broke out, Sergeant René Camard joined the 329th Regiment, and on 28 August 1914, during the Great Retreat of the 1st Army, he was wounded by a shrapnel bullet in the shoulder in Guise, before being fatally injured in combat on 16 March 1915, in the Carnoy sector. He died while encouraging his men during the fight for possession of a funnel dug by an enemy mine furnace. A few days later, the Croix de Guerre was awarded to him posthumously.