Lyon vs. Toulouse (It’s Back to Work!)

By: Inara | January 12th, 2008

I can’t believe how quickly winter break flew by. I’ve been enjoying the “respite” from blogging duties by not having having to worry about game previews and recaps, but now it’s back to business.

Our first game post-holidays is against Toulouse, a really annoying team for Lyon to play. We haven’t defeated them in the last three games and in fact have been playing them at the same times for the past two years (second game of the fall, first game of the winter). The last time we faced them, it was in August. Kim Kallstrom was expelled and Cris injured his ligaments. We lost 1-0, and after that, Lyon’s season went downhill for a while. People began muttering that Lyon’s dominance was at an end. But that was a long time ago, and the Lyon of August and the Lyon of January should be an entirely different proposition.

January 12nd, 2008
Stade de Gerland, Lyon
2 PM Eastern Time (20:00 in France)

Match background:

I’m really tired of losing to Toulouse. In fact, I don’t even have the energy to make a pun out of that. Suffice it to say that we need to stop being Elie Baup’s whipping boys. It also doesn’t help that Johan Elmander, Toulouse’s start striker, scores against Lyon in what is becoming a regular basis.

But while Lyon have gotten better and better since August, Toulouse have been underachieving. They’ve gone from being Champions League participants to barely hanging onto 12th place in the league. They started out the second half of their season on the wrong foot as well – they lost to third division Paris FC in the Coupe de France. Worse for them, they are losing four important players to the African Cup of Nations – Achille Emana, Francileudo dos Santos, Fode Mansare, and Kevin Constant. In 19 games, they’ve scored 19 goals and conceded 21. Ten of those goals were scored by Elmander.

As for Lyon, they’ve started their winter campaign on the right foot. After a convincing victory over Creteil, Lyon will want to build their momentum. Though winter is traditionally a difficult time for Lyon, Perrin has been hoping to fix the problem by changing the training schedule and by forcing the players to play competitively from the start (as opposed to Gerard Houllier, who allowed his players to take it easy their first week back from holidays).

Though Lyon are in first place, they are only four points ahead of Nancy. So Lyon really need this win in order to bolster their lead, especially since Nancy will be weakened by the African Cup of Nations. Lyon on the other hand aren’t really affected by the tournament because the only player they are losing is Kader Keita, who hasn’t been influential for Lyon so far anyway. With 38 goals scored and 16 conceded, Lyon should have the advantage.

Lyon info:

The best news is that Gregory Coupet is back! He played against Creteil and looked pretty good, but this will be his first big test against a team that has always given Lyon a hard time. Cris and Patrick Muller are still out, though Cris will be returning to Lyon next week.

Sidney Govou is still out with a pulled thigh muscle that he picked up against Nancy, though he should be back soon. Francois Clerc also suffered the same at practice a few days ago, so he will be missing the match as a precaution as well.

Le groupe lyonnais: Coupet, Vercoutre, Grosso, Cleber Anderson, Squillaci, Réveillère, Paillot, Toulalan, Beynié, Källström, Juninho, Bodmer, Ben Arfa, Rémy, Mounier, Fred, Baros, Benzema.

Lyon’s two newest recruits, Cesar Delgado and Marc Crosas, will not be listed on the bench, though we may see them during next Wednesday’s Coupe de la Ligue match against Le Mans. Also, Fred has been included in the list of players though he may be transferred any day now.

Expected Lineup:

Coupet
Reveillere – Squillaci – Anderson – Grosso
Juninho – Toulalan – Kallstrom
Ben Arfa – Baros – Benzema

I expect Perrin will utilize his best lineup possible. With Clerc injured, and with Nadir Belhadj’s departure, I don’t see what other back four Perrin can put out on the pitch. The preferred midfield setup of Juninho, Jeremy Toulalan, and Kim Kallstrom should be starting, though there is always the chance that Mathieu Bodmer might start in the place of Kallstrom.

As for the front three, with both Govou and Keita absent, that leaves only one experienced winger, Hatem Ben Arfa. I highly doubt that Perrin would start Loic Remy or Anthony Mounier. So that means that Karim Benzema will have to start out wide. But if Lyon can dominate comfortably, Benzema will probably drift to the center, and Kallstrom will move a bit further up.

Viewing Options:

Check for streams here. I’ll also try to post links in the comments tomorrow.

Expected Result:

Toulouse is a tough team, but they are missing Emana and Mansare, and Elmander may have a hard time breaching the Lyon defense – weak as it is – by himself. So I’m thinking it will be 2-0.