• Olympique Lyonnais lost for the eighth time this season on Saturday against RC Strasbourg (1-2) in Ligue 1.

  • If this setback seems unthinkable given how Laurent Blanc's men dominated the entire game (28 shots to 8), it says a lot about the club's difficulties (8th) to bounce back and continue to believe in European qualification. .

  • Above all, the evening revealed a deep divide between the club and its two corners of supporters, who insistently targeted players, as well as Vincent Ponsot and Bruno Cheyrou.

At OL Park,

We prepare for almost everything when we follow the adventures of Olympique Lyonnais in Ligue 1 every week. But we have to admit, we never thought of going to Google Translate, in the middle of the night, to find ensure that the word

incompetent

is more understandable for John Textor than the mythical

I recup the ball

of Nabil Fekir.

And yes, because the banners flew on Saturday evening on the occasion of an eighth defeat in Ligue 1 this season against RC Strasbourg (1-2), including this one, well chiselled by the south bend: " 

John, the house is burning, fire the incompetents

 ”.

At 8:58 p.m., just before kick-off, the

punchline

laid the foundations for a nightmarish evening for Laurent Blanc's players, alongside the huge goat brandished by the north bend to accompany a banner in the same vein: "Don't let's not let our club go up in smoke.

Because inevitably, the official downgrading of OL, both deprived of any title since 2012, but also of qualification for the Champions League since 2019, has something to alert Lyon supporters, filled with nostalgia when they talk about the seven coronations consecutive in Ligue 1 in the 2000s.


“We are so close to relegation”

And how better to mark this observation, for the premiere at Parc OL of American businessman John Textor in the costume of the club's official majority shareholder, than by losing against the 19th in the championship, who until there only one success in 18 days, and no victory in Lyon in Ligue 1 since 1979?

To do this with panache, OL (current 8th) destroyed a finally coherent performance (28 shots to 8, 72% possession of the ball) by conceding in particular a second burlesque goal, with a corner in their favor at the start, and in the end a series of dumplings of which he has the secret (0-2, 32nd).

"We punished ourselves with our clumsiness in the first half," confirms Laurent Blanc.

“There is a feeling of shame, inevitably, when we see the very disappointing gap between our ranking, what we are currently doing, and our ambitions, even slips Alexandre Lacazette, whose penalty for hope did not enough Saturday (1-2, 45th + 2).

It's dangerous to see that we are so close to relegation.

Well, there is still a margin of 10 points with the red zone, but at the same time, the gap is much larger with the podium (at 17 points), while the Top 5 could be 12 points depending Sunday's results.

"The whole team is affected"

The Lyon captain, who admitted the day before “not to look at the classification nor the gaps with the European places”, tries well to recover: “When you play at OL, you can only think of the top of the table.

There is only one victory that will help us get our heads above water”.

Even next Saturday in the Coupe de France against Chambéry (National 3), and as a bonus at home, does that count?

It will undoubtedly take a hell of a series to allow this group, which remains on a goal scored in 270 minutes of play (on a disputed penalty), to get their heads back in place.

And even more to try to win back the bends of supporters who poured out all their resentment on Saturday, after being so contained for long weeks.

Banners bearing the effigy of Houssem Aouar, Moussa Dembélé and Karl Toko Ekambi with the mention "Get out", a bronca rarely seen at the time of the exit of the Cameroonian striker, as well as insults against him... Bad Gones and Lyon 1950 did not go to any lengths against Strasbourg.

“Karl is inevitably disappointed, and such a situation is never easy, commented Alexandre Lacazette.

We are a collective, we will try to help him to move forward.

The whole team is affected.

»

“We have identified the evil”

Jean-Michel Aulas, who spoke of "a feeling of waste" about this upside-down evening, did not appear more shocked than that by the treatment targeting certain players: "Supporters have the right to say what they think of the players, of the team, that's the game”.

A nuanced position not so surprising given that the Lyon president readily admits wanting to significantly renew the workforce by January 31.

For the past two days, we have worked with John to give ourselves the means to revive the mechanism, with a certain number of quick initiatives during the transfer window.

We are going to shake things up significantly before the end of the month.

You really have to create a spark that will change the mindset.

We have identified the evil as it is perceived by the supporters, but also obviously by us.

»


🧐 Booed by his supporters when he left, Karl Toko Ekambi took revenge on the trash can in the hallways of the stadium...#OLRCSA I #PrimeVideoLigue1 pic.twitter.com/7epCWIgmnd

— Prime Video Sport France (@PVSportFR) January 14, 2023

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There would therefore be nothing surprising, for example, to see Karl Toko Ekambi (0 goal in his last 12 games since September 11), who joined the locker room mad with rage as soon as he was replaced on Saturday, not without smashing a trash can, leave Lyon this winter.

But the players mentioned were not the only people in the sights of the groups of supporters.

They have indeed demanded the resignation of football director Vincent Ponsot (insulted when passing through the south bend) and recruitment manager Bruno Cheyrou.

And that, it does not pass at all on the side of Jean-Michel Aulas, reassembled as rarely.

“Unfair” attacks against Ponsot and Cheyrou

“When they attack leaders who are exemplary, it is me they are attacking, he balances.

They have to stop, it's particularly unfair.

We have two high quality leaders who work day and night for the club, for us, for them.

I therefore cannot accept this style of expression which is without any reality with the work carried out.

Leave Vincent Ponsot and Bruno Cheyrou alone.

I'm the first to be able to judge them because I hired them.

John is saddened by the result and like me, he had a bad experience of this match in terms of initiatives from the stands.

These attitudes are not worthy of a very big club like Olympique Lyonnais.

»

JMA has consistently defended the record of its two key managers since Juninho's controversial departure in December 2021. But it's clear that while in the eyes of major supporter groups he remains partly on a pedestal for his entire work in the 2000s, this is not the case for Vincent Ponsot and Bruno Cheyrou.

The turns fully associate them with the long period of scarcity of the club.


“There will be turbulence”

Aware that his club, which has lost its three best players for two years (Memphis Depay, Bruno Guimaraes and Lucas Paqueta), is slowly but surely sinking into the soft underbelly of the championship, Jean-Michel Aulas wants to be reassuring: "It's is true that we have a club that is suffering at the moment.

But there are incredible infrastructures and a high quality coach.

All Laurent Blanc he is, he only allowed OL to take 11 points in his first 9 games, which is insufficient to eye Europe again.

The former PSG coach did not run away from the subject of the crisis, which on Saturday took the form of a deep break with the bends.

We were already in a difficult situation before that game, so you can imagine our situation now.

But I told the players that certain things had to be assumed.

If we are there, it is also our fault.

We have to assume everything that goes with it, and we know that there will be turbulence.

»

These "turbulences", which have already not failed against Strasbourg (with even significant overflows before and after the match), are not likely to cause Jean-Michel Aulas (73) to lose his good old withdrawal techniques in the Coué method: “Tonight's game is probably one of the best we've had since the start of the season.

It shows that we have regained our dynamism, the intensity and the speed that we have been asking the team for some time.

I would like everyone to realize that the club will recover.

I take responsibility for it.

We are not the only club in Europe to have these difficulties.

Look at Chelsea and others”.

Well, what if the Textor-Aulas tandem posed 120 million

euros to get ahead of the Blues in extremis on the Mykhaylo Mudryk file, and thus relaunch as if by magic in 2023?

OK, it's as credible as seeing Karl Toko Ekambi turn into a capo in the north bend after patching things up with the Bad Gones, or discovering OL on the Ligue 1 podium in June.

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