During a breathless 37th day, ASSE (dam before the meeting) lost on Saturday against Stade de Reims (1-2).
The success of FC Metz (1-0) against Angers at the same time completely upsets the bottom of the classification, and the Greens are no longer masters of their destiny, before FC Nantes-ASSE and PSG-Metz on the final day on Saturday next.
Pascal Dupraz and his players return to the reasons for this “loss of too many”, which could be synonymous with a return to Ligue 2 for Sainté, after 18 consecutive seasons in the top flight.
At the Geoffroy-Guichard stadium,
The north corner of Parc OL took advantage of the famous 42nd minute of its match against Nantes (3-2) on Saturday to deploy an unequivocal banner for Lyon players: “Save the season, lose at Clermont”.
And this in order to try to rush the Greens into Ligue 2 next week.
Except that Clermont (16th) finally got out of the woods even before their match against OL, during the 38th day of L1.
On the other hand, in their misfortune of having definitively abandoned their European ambitions on May 8 after their improbable defeat in Metz (3-2), OL have thereby played a very bad trick on their neighbor and historic rival.
Because this place outside the red zone (17th or 18th) that AS Saint-Etienne had occupied for two and a half months was jeopardized in the middle of the final sprint by the poor performance of Olympian Saint-Symphorien.
Until emerging on Saturday, one day from the end, in a disaster scenario behind closed doors against Reims (1-2) which could condemn to relegation both the Girondins de Bordeaux and the band of Pascal Dupraz, now 19th.
"Astounding athletic deficiencies at this level"
He readily admitted to feeling "consternation and dejection", after this "defeat too many", and before trying to save the club next Saturday in Nantes during a new multiplex with suspense, which will see FC Metz (new 18th in goal difference) challenge PSG at the Parc des Princes at the same time.
"By dint of not taking points while they are reaching out to us, this match against Reims was of capital importance", continues the former Toulouse coach.
It's simple, since its precious success (1-0) on March 6 against Metz, its direct competitor in place of play-off, ASSE has only taken 6 points out of 30, with spectacular cracks in the second half. (from 0-2 to 6-2 in Lorient and from 0-2 to 4-2 in Nice on Wednesday).
“Our first half was good today, we could have taken the advantage.
Then in the second half, it is always the same shortcomings that come back, in particular the athletic shortcomings which are bewildering at this level, ”points out the Haut-Savoyard coach sharply, before continuing his surprising expertise on the subject.
There are too many players who unfortunately do not have the athletic skills to meet the requirements of Ligue 1. For too many players, there is no more petrol in the engine, it is a real problem.
There is also the question of the cubic capacity, and it is difficult to change it.
»
Good performance in Nantes or eightfold Mbappé against Metz?
Do the Saint-Etienne players confirm this surprising analysis?
“We saw around the 60th minute tonight that we swallowed the soup a little [and not the trumpet, sic] and that we couldn't hold the ball, approves Wahbi Khazri.
Reims therefore inevitably sent us waves.
It will take 20 men to do the maximum in Nantes and we must now put our c…”.
A 100% guaranteed formula fights for the maintenance that his coach will not deny, who wrote two of his main career feats on a 38th day of L1, during a Sochaux-ETG (0-3) in 2014 and the essential Angers-TFC (2-3) of 2016.
The Greens will have to obtain a better result in Nantes than will FC Metz in Paris, with less than two defeats… with an eightfold from Kylian Mbappé in the key, the Lorrains counting six goals ahead of Sainté.
Who knows
?
But how did ASSE find a way to lose its place as a play-off which seemed to be reaching out to it, what is more in the face of a Stade de Reims (12th) with nothing left to play for?
Falaye Sacko's long injury was expensive
“Since December 15, I have been tinkering behind”, already loose Pascal Dupraz, to justify this new
disaster class
of his five-man defense, systematically pierced in the second period, especially by the agility of the promising Hugo Ekitike, who came into play at the break. .
Of their four defeats in a row (current series at the worst of times), the Greens have conceded 12 goals.
How can we seriously imagine scratching saving points for the maintenance by conceding three goals per game on average?
The long injury of the most convincing winter rookie, Falaye Sacko (entered the game on Saturday) did not help the second worst defense in Ligue 1, with now 76 goals conceded.
Add to that a lack of success, between "a contentious situation" with an equalizer denied to Romain Hamouma for a slight contact on the arm of Predrag Rajkovic (1-2, 72nd) and a free kick from Wahbi Khazri flirting with the skylight of the Reims goalkeeper in added time, and you have more than ever a good composite portrait of a relegated in power.
“We may be in our place”
And as Pascal Dupraz pointed out, this broken dynamic, after the series of 4 successes in 6 games in the winter, highlights the inability of this team to deliver a full match.
The intense pressing of the first period on Saturday then gave way to a group completely cut off and lost to the rapid counter-attacks of Reims.
"We knew that as the match progressed, there would be more and more space," said Stade de Reims captain Yunis Abdelhamid.
The more the meeting progressed, the less intense the races and the pressing from Saint-Etienne.
We knew how to take advantage of it.
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Our file on ASSE
Like so many others before them.
Which pushes Wahbi Khazri to a lucid observation: “The reality is that after 37 days, we are 19th.
We may be in our place, but we intend to remain mobilized ”.
Pascal Dupraz, for his part, likes to recall that his players were "moribund" when he took over from Claude Puel and Julien Sablé on the bench, with only 12 points on the counter at the break.
They are not far from it since Saturday evening and this disastrous turning point costing them 18th place.
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