It is often said in football that one should not draw big conclusions after simple preparation matches, and that the truth of the ground should be reserved only for the competition. Except that the Lyon summer announced many warning signs, to the point that this totally failed start to the season is far from trivial. OL thus chained four friendly defeats without scoring a single goal before resuming Ligue 1.
Laurent Blanc insisted that he had seen good intentions and that land was essential, no one is fooled. Today, with only one point taken in three days, the balance sheet leaves something to be desired, and the content is no better.
For a while now, Olympique Lyonnais has gotten us used to mediocrity and is no longer among the top names in this championship. However, this is an anomaly given the stature of this club, seven times winner of the L1 in the heart of the 2000s, second budget on par with OM and which has one of the very best training centers in Europe. But downgrading is a reality in the Rhône, where OL have not been scary for a long time. If the Gones obtained 23 qualifications in a row in the European Cup from 1998 to 2020, today they have much more the head of a candidate with a soft stomach.
Corentin Tolisso, part of this team, himself recognized Sunday evening at the microphone of Prime Video this new dimension of OL, which has regressed over the years. “Today, we are Olympique Lyonnais from 2023-2024. We are not the Olympique Lyonnais of 2002-2003. Or 2015-2016 if you want. We have more difficulties. We are not going to take ourselves for others, we are not like our predecessors[…] Today, we are happy to come and take a point here, in Nice. This last sentence says a lot about OL’s current ambitions…
???Corentin Tolisso: “Today, we are the OL of 2024, not that of 2002. We are happy to take a point in Nice.”
The change of ownership, with the departure of the historic Jean-Michel Aulas, was to usher in a new era at Groupama Stadium. We will obviously give time to John Textor and his teams to prove themselves, but the assumption of duties by the American businessman has not been easy. He must therefore deal with the former boss of OL who, like an auntie Danielle in top form, regularly sends him spades in the press and on social networks.
There is also an undoubtedly more serious problem for the investor from the country of Uncle Sam: the financial policeman of French football, the DNCG, did not appreciate that OL took his recommendations down. Result, the sanction fell: the Gones are limited in their recruitment, with a supervised payroll. Worse still, after flexing his muscles and promising that his best players wouldn’t leave this summer, Textor had to resign himself to letting Castello Lukeba go, who ended up joining Leipzig. Bradley Barcola, Lyon revelation of 2023, could also pack his bags by the end of the transfer window this Thursday, August 31.
In the middle of this, Laurent Blanc looks simply lost. In office since October 2022, the Lyon coach seems detached from the situation and often quips by asking if the best solution would not be to… replace him. We had never seen that and in modern football where new technologies have taken on viral importance, Laurent Blanc has not taken this turn and remains stuck with the good old methods, which unfortunately seem outdated.
But in this heavy atmosphere, there is nevertheless real hope for the Lyon supporters. The arrival of Matthieu Louis-Jean at the head of recruitment offers some encouraging prospects. Despite the limits imposed by the DNCG, the former manager of Manchester United and Olympique de Marseille landed with ideas and proposals that are out of the ordinary (Guido Rodriguez, Ernest Nuamah). It remains to be seen whether he will be given the time necessary to complete his project, given the ambient cacophony in this club.
Next Sunday, a reinvigorated PSG like Mbappé will come to Lyon. The two teams have not been boxing for a while in the same category and OL will try to limit the damage, or to do the feat like a little Thumb in the Coupe de France. Difficult to hope for better, but Alexandre Lacazette and his family are now destined for this new life, while waiting for the thinning.
