Now 7th, 10 lengths from OM (2nd), Olympique Lyonnais (7th) is already playing very big this Friday (9 p.m.) against Toulouse.
Alexandre Lacazette's partners are indeed at a standstill in Ligue 1, with four consecutive defeats on the clock.
This current black series, like the surprising retention of Peter Bosz, symbolizes the glaring lack of ambition/requirements of an OL in full "downgrading" in the league.
“I was upset and irritated because the team is cutesy, which I can't stand.
For a group that is where it is, it's abnormal, unacceptable.
It is my role and my duty as president to react.
No, this media outing by Jean-Michel Aulas did not take place after Olympique Lyonnais' fourth consecutive loss on Sunday in Lens (1-0), but after the previous equally dark series, there are 31 year.
At the time, Raymond Domenech was a young coach and Bruno Genesio a valuable midfielder for this Lyon team.
But even if OL were still very far from relying on the chessboard of French football, in March 1991, its ambitious president was much more demanding than today.
Before Toulouse's high-risk reception this Friday (9 p.m.), JMA spent his week supporting Peter Bosz and demanding "patience" about him, while his club (7th) is in full drowning, at 10 points from the Marseille rival (2nd), and even 8 lengths from Lorient (3rd) in just 9 Ligue 1 days.
"Athletes are no longer the top priority at OL"
“The president should have made the same speech on Sunday as in 1991, confides Gilles Rousset, OL goalkeeper during this 1990-1991 season which ended in 5th place, only two years after the rise in the elite.
There is a big gap between his current statements and what we can see on the pitch, namely the absence of play, creativity and surpassing oneself.
It's a situation of denial: everything goes to pieces but those in charge don't see it, or don't say it.
For 15 years, until 2019, Gilles Rousset was the goalkeeping coach of the academy then the assistant coach of the reserve team and the U19s of OL.
He now delivers a look as severe as it is lucid on the evolution of the club.
By detaching myself emotionally from OL since 2019, I became aware of the fall of the club, which has lost its soul.
Everyone pulls in their own direction.
The move from Gerland to Décines was essential economically, but it was an earthquake in terms of the state of mind.
The training, which is in Meyzieu, is now cut off from the pros.
There are offices, commissions and directors everywhere, and the athlete is no longer the top priority at OL.
In 1991, the means had nothing to do but the ambition was present.
It was a construction phase, and here we are in full deconstruction.
We are going through a downgrade.
»
Always in the Top 5 from 1998 to 2020
The word is out and it makes sense, as Lyon is bogged down in mediocrity for a long time.
Since its semi-final of the Champions League in 2010, the second budget of French football has only twice finished in second place (2015 and 2016) in 12 seasons of Ligue 1. The partners of Anthony Lopes, who again presented OL on Wednesday as "one of the biggest clubs in Europe", are even launched towards a fourth consecutive year without a podium, and therefore without qualification for the Champions League.
Worse, while Lyon had never been out of the Top 5 since 1998, it has just had a 7th place in 2020 (season stopped by the Covid-19), an 8th place in 2022, and it is vegetating again at the 7th place.
All under the benevolent gaze of a boss above all (pre) occupied for long weeks by the thorny sale of the club to John Textor.
“In 2002, the year of our first victory in Ligue 1, we were quickly out of the two national cups, as well as the UEFA Cup, remembers former Lyon defender Jean-Marc Chanelet.
The president had come into the locker room to make us aware of the consequences of not qualifying for the Champions League.
We then understood our essential role in sustaining the economic balance of the club and all its employees in the shadows.
Twenty years ago, there was at worst a general questioning after two defeats, and not after four setbacks.
»
Nine titled clubs excluding PSG for ten years
And again, the Lyon supporters are waiting to see a collective reaction worthy of the name this Friday, after the poor meeting in Lens (1-0 without the slightest shot on target).
“Before this match, I had no illusions anyway, sighs RIchard, subscriber to the south turn.
It was inevitable that we were going to be beaten there, like everywhere outside now.
Our downgrading is done in a natural way when we see that at the beginning of October, the podium is already no longer playable for a so-called big French club.
»
Faced with the hexagonal stranglehold of the Parisian ogre QSI version for a decade, the economic argument remains most often pointed to justify the interminable shortage of titles in Lyon since the Coupe de France 2012. Montpellier, Monaco and Lille are however all became French champions during this period, and ASSE, Bordeaux, Guingamp, Strasbourg, Rennes and Nantes won a national cup.
As many titles as the second Ligue 1 budget followed from afar.
Players “overprotected and cleared”
“The worst thing is that you have nevertheless put in the means in recent years, with more than 80 million euros spent which have been of no use to you between Andersen, Reine-Adélaïde, Mendes, Faivre and so many other recruits, plague Richard.
This supporter points to a crying barometer of Lyon's downgrading: “At one time, when our players left OL, it was to join big clubs.
Today, incumbents are leaving to sign for Aston Villa, Burnley or Herta Berlin”…
According to Richard, the end of the requirement dates back to the epilogue of the Hubert Fournier era, sacked in December 2015 after a disastrous first part of the season: "During the three and a half years with Bruno Genesio, there were excuses to everything goes to overprotect and clear the players, from the refereeing to the snack posing a problem in the event of a match at 1 or 3 p.m.
Who would have imagined, in the heart of the 2000s, that Jean-Michel Aulas would not separate immediately
from
a coach who had completed a full season without European qualification, before going on to four defeats in a row?
“We have to find a way to renew ourselves”
According to our information, OL management, represented by the Aulas-Ponsot-Cheyrou trio, wanted to meet last spring with the two main groups of Lyon supporters, namely Bad Gones and Lyon 1950, in order to question them on their reaction if Peter Bosz is retained for 2022-2023.
They were then in favor of this option.
This was able to comfort the Lyon leaders in their surprising choice, which is accompanied by a flat encephalogram in the game. Even during the lean period planned by JMA, with a view to the construction of the OL Park, Rémi's OL Garde (4th, 3rd and 5th from 2011 to 2014) delighted his supporters much more than today.
Examples of progressively declining clubs, after having been dominant, are not lacking in France, from ASSE to Bordeaux.
The one that potentially comes closest to Lyon news is FC Nantes, champion of France in 1995 and 2001, and winner of the 1999 and 2000 editions of the Coupe de France, before falling into the soft underbelly of the championship, then in Ligue 2 twice (2007 and 2009).
With the key 21 years without a title, until the Coupe de France with Antoine Kombouaré last May.
Olivier Quint, who played at Beaujoire from 2001 to 2006, remembers this downgrading of the Canaries.
When you have won so many titles, you remain a great club.
We clung to everything that had been done, we told ourselves that it could come back.
But we have to find how to renew ourselves, to bounce back, precisely when OL emerged in the early 2000s. There were the departures of major figures like Eric Carrière, then Mickaël Landreau and Jérémy Toulalan, but the big turning point was the dismissal of Raynald Denoueix in December 2001. The new management relied less and less on the training center and recruited players who did not fit into the club's project.
»
The Rayan Cherki symbol
The second part of Olivier Quint's explanation corresponds better to the current slump in Lyon than the first, when we see how young shooters Castello Lukeba and Malo Gusto (both 19 years old) are installed on the front line, with no real competition for their position.
“We feel a general resignation, a somewhat apathetic group, and not a united team that hates defeat, continues Jean-Marc Chanelet.
Players are both overrated and comfortable in terms of salary.
Compared to the 2000s, OL pays a player a little ahead of his potential rather than what he has already proven at the club with the professional team.
It will not encourage players to hurt each other and pull in the same direction as a team like RC Lens can show.
»
Our file on OL
One can in particular think of the situation of Rayan Cherki (19 years old), who has just extended to an estimated monthly salary above 200,000 euros gross, while he has only 1 goal scored and 9 tenures in Ligue 1. One of the many quirks of a club with an unbalanced workforce, which discovers new direct competitors every year, from Rennes to Lens, and now even Lorient.
Damn endless downgrading.
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Olympique Lyonnais (OL)
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