Jean-Claude Dassier vowed to bring a "unifying" spirit to Marseille after being confirmed as the French club's new president.

Dassier has left his job as director of French television channel TF1 in order to take up a three-year contract at the Stade Velodrome.

He will take office and be officially presented to the press tomorrow, and cannot wait to get going in his new role.

"I feel great pride but also, I should not deny, a lot of emotion," he told www.om.net.

"This morning, I said my farewells to my colleagues at TF1, where I had been for 22 years. At the same time, it is now an exciting and a great challenge.

"It is a big responsibility. Marseille is the top French club for me and it always has been."

The 67-year-old held talks over the weekend with club owner and close friend Robert Louis-Dreyfus about the post, which was vacated last week by the resignation of Pape Diouf.

Dassier believes OM, who will compete in the Champions League next season after finishing second in Ligue 1 to Bordeaux last term, have the right men in charge to continue their progression.

He said: "This will obviously be Jose Anigo as sports director and Didier Deschamps as coach which, I think, is a good partnership. I will try to help them to the best of my ability. I'm here for that.

"I come to rally, as a man of unity, as a man of understanding.

"If there are misunderstandings or unfortunate statements, we will clarify this.

"What interests me is that the team in place at present and the reinforcements that will join us in the coming weeks so we can have an even better season next year.

"Together, as a club, we must continue the momentum that Pape Diouf has built up. We must do even better next year."

Jean-Pierre Bernes, the right-hand man to former Marseille president Bernard Tapie, was linked at the weekend with the role of Dassier's advisor.

Dassier has since had a rethink about appointing Bernes in an official capacity after sporting director Jose Anigo expressed his opposition to the suggestion.

And Bernes is fully behind the new regime, according to the new president.

"Of course I had a long talk with him," said Dassier. "To speak frankly, for me Jean-Pierre Bernes is also the man from the golden era of OM along with Bernard Tapie and others.

"It was the great time and it was something I wanted to return to. But if it causes problems that I did not realise at the time, we no longer speak of it.

"Jean-Pierre is the first to agree. But he is a man who has earned a solid reputation in football. He has an unquestioned and unquestionable competence.

"He is the agent and friend of Didier Deschamps and we will help as and when he can. I do not doubt that for a second."