Run Through Game Three?

So moving on from the CL draw. Montpellier has had a fantastic start to the season and we are a tired bunch. A win tomorrow would be amazing and Licha did promise to score.

On paper I would say Lyon is the stronger team;however, like you said our entire team is worn out. I would imagine that by this time the U-20 group (who by the way played their hearts out in Colombia) has already arrived back in Lyon and have already begun training. I think players arriving late to the "party" will be given the opportunity to play in very vital areas in order for some of our stronger players, like Licha/Gomis/Bastos etc. to rest because they've had a couple more days to rest since their last game. With that said this could very well be a tough game, but hopefully we will have the opportunity to see some of our youger talent, I especially hope to see Lacazette on the pitch tomorrow.

Anything less then the first place in this group is a big disapointment!

*Anything less than second in this group is a big disapointment

Lets not kid ourselves Madrid are twice the team we are when playing well,and under a coach like Mourinho,theyll be playing well 99% of the time,finishing second above Ajax is the priority,and if we can get a draw against Real at Geland then that will be nice. Im not being ultra negative,but you have to be real with yourself-Madrid are the 2nd or 3rd best team in the world-and took us back to school at the bernabeu last year. Finishing 2nd is impressive anyway.

yes, i concede that madrid are a far superior side to us at the moment, but, at the same time, i believe the gap between Madrid and Lyon is the same as the gap between Lyon and Ajax, and this is why we should definitely finish 2nd in our group.

im not trying to debate with you. But last year, the team was under Puel

This year were under Garde,and Gardes no Mourinho(yet). Come on,Reals players are excellent-Ronaldo,Ozil,Di Maria,Benzema,Kaka,Higuain...and now a solid defence. As good as guys like Lisandro and Gourcuff are,there just a slight level below-and at this level thats a lot.

topping the group is well within the possible.  most obvious scenario:  we split points with real, either DD or WL, and real lose focus and drop points in one of their other four matches as well, and we do not. not going through to knockouts would be very disappointing given this group, as long as we get our injured players and U20 back up to form in the next couple of months.  adding a DM would be nice!

Under other Madrid managers thats a plausable arguement,Mourinho analyses everything though,so slip ups arent his style. 2 draws is possible,a win will be difficult.

dont know where all this positivity comes from. we barely got past rubin kazan..and we just tied ajaccio (at home) and brest...lets just look ahead to our game tomorrow against montpelier, rather than speculate by how much we're gonna beat madrid by...

Barely got past Kazan? Dude...regardless of the result, we were the far superior team. With a bit more freshness we would've scored all those 1 on 1 situations and the aggregate score would've looked a lot better, something like 6-2. Rubin had nowhere near as good chances as we had. We schooled them, even without all our depth.
Ajaccio and Brest got lucky. Rookie's misfortune of R. Garde.
Not saying we're gonna beat RM, just saying something realistically positive. We have a fairly good team, a promising coach, and a couple of very good players in infirmary waiting to strengthen the team even more. Finishing 2nd in CL group shouldn't be too hard.

I'm starting to think the CL draw is somehow fixed, I mean Real for like the 1000th time, but in all seriousness this is a really tough group. How I hope our problems in the midfield are all solved by the time the first match day comes. 

We will kick Dinamo trust me!! Malmo destroy them!! Even Dinamo past trought!!! We can beat Ajax, and well we love Real in group stages hehehehhe

we surely will give Madrid a hard time at Gerland!

sidney you nailed it with that comment come on guys worried about dinamo zagreb????? and ajax have lost so many key players of late emanuelson suarez de zeeuw etc we must surely finish 2nd in this group. Also, heres something to think about: How big is it now to sign ndinga???? He has experience playing against both Ajax and Real Madrid last year in the group stages with Auxerre. Hes experience in those matches could be critical!

Dinamo iz from Croatia, I'm from Croatia! I know how Dinamo play, and how Dinamo can play!! Soo I dont have to worry about them

See you at Maksimir stadium xD

Can't believe we got Madrid again!! At least we don't have to face them in the knockout rounds if we make it through. 

Looks like we finish second in the group stages again; let's pray.

Yeah, but then we get the chance to play another big team not named madrid

ARGH fucking Real - it's just that it's boring now! Give us someone else to try!

I wish we were in Porto's group. 

I think we are the group of death--though Group A looks pretty bad too!

our group isnt so bad! We should be able to finish comfortably in 2nd place. Ajax and Dinamo are weaker sides than Rubin

Give Ajax more credit than that-there better than Rubin-Real to win the group comfortably,Dinamo to be bottom,and a fight between us and Ajax for 2nd-Id say its pretty evenly matched between us-were better than them,but not by much. Theyve lost players,but they ALWAYS bring in talented dutch players there-its like a conveyorbelt-and theyve got tidy team spirit to..Ajax-Lyon,will be very interesting,with us edging it im sure..Ndinga wont do anything imo for either sides,yes hes played against them once or twice-but how does that help ? Our guys played against real last season anyway-a cheaper DM is better for us,ideally id like a quality RW to,if were playing in a 4-4-2,Briands just pedestrian at the highest level.

I just cannot understand why everyone is freaking out about this group! If we cannot finish top 2 in a group like this, we are a shit team. Ajax lost 4-0 at home to Real last year and dinamo zagreb people??? dinamo zagreb is scaring you??? give me a break.

I don't know about that. I can totally see Ajax and Dinamo upsetting us--but I do think we have a decent chance of claiming the number 2 spot.

Every year Real Madrid in our CL group! Mon Dieu!

with our luck we're gonna get man city and dortmund in our group as well...

What's this about Cissokho bitching "every day" that he want's move abroad?

Pied needs a chance to prove himself, he always looks lively when he comes on but doesnt have the time to get into the game and develop. Hopefully he will get bigger and better opportunities during the season

Huh..tax increase for the rich.
How is this going to affect Ligue 1 teams, more specifically Lyon, Marseille, PSG?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/busi...

The group stage beckons. I am hoping that Arsenal, Porto, Inter are paired with Lyon, Marseille, Lille not necessarily in that order.

:) Yay! 

licha did not play well at all this game. love him to death but i was very disappointed

Lilo needs a rest.

True. Pjanic looking more like the lone striker.

Commentator : Kone hit a potentially 30 million pound goal!

Kone has paid off in spades: who many times his purchase cost has he produced for OL?

Kone is playing so well

good on the kid for coming up big in a CL match!

KONE!!!!!!!!! horray!! goal from a corner kick!

YES YES YES YES YES!!!!

bastos hits the post!!!

WTF!

That looked like legitimate blocking of the ball by Briand!

rubin goal. it was a matter of time

time to hold our breaths.

wow...missing all these one on ones is gonna cost us...fuck

i expected more from licha...

gomis! ALMOST scored an EASY goal!!

not a great half in terms of attacking. we really didnt do much. and gomis is looking awfully slow and tired. only good chance was one by gonalon where the keeper did well.
in terms of defense we're doing very well. kone is mistake-free and has been making very good decisions.
if we can step up our attack a little more this game is a wrap.
ALLEZ!

Kone made a mistake-almost let Karadeniz in mid way through the first half,and almost gave away a penalty through handball...looks cool but nervous-5 or 6/10 at the moment.

can't find link.  skysports showing 64-36 possession, and significant pass completion percentage, in favor of RK.

Im watching it on skysports 2..theyre having a lot of possession Rubin,but theres a running joke in commentary that its all been between there back three-so nothing to worry about-dull game so far..

stats suggest OL picking it up a bit in 2nd half ...

half time 0-0... anyone?

did everyone forget the game is early today?

i did! lol

Rumor has it that Blanc will be calling Gomis and Cissokho up for the next pair of matches.

did anyone read this?

http://www.lequipe.fr/Football...

Yes. It makes no sense: Belhanda is an attacking midfielder. We already have four, five if you count Reale.

My worry is that we have too many young players in critical positions, especially defense.  Lovren's tackle at the end was horrendous and I'm sure that if Kone hadn't already been sent off, the ref would have produced a second yellow on him. I was surprised when he didn't do it anyway. So close to throwing the game away.

For those of you who didn't have a chance to watch the game, and want to make your own opinion, here is where you can download the game (with french commentary):

FIRST HALF:http://www.fileserve.com/file/...

SECOND HALF:http://www.fileserve.com/file/...

that sidy kone kid really pissed me off, Gonalons is already standing near the 4th red waiting to replace him and he goes and does that horrible tackle in the middle of the park. stupid and irresponsible..

 4th ref, even*

Lacombe says signing Ndinga will be difficult-most managers(or presidants assistants) do say that sort of thing regards transfers. He also said were looking for a cb which I found odd,seeing as Kone came in.

I think it will come to sigining M. Diarra at the last minute. Or maybe I'm wrong and OL will let themselves get robbed once again.
As for a CB, maybe the cases of the Glass-Ghanaean and Kryptonite-Cris are worse than we thought and they need cover for Kone and Lovren. But if that were the case, why wouldn't they just use Faure/Seguin?  

Id be surprised if they gave up on Ndinga,theyve persued him all summer,from what we know,so it would all seem a big fat waste of time just to go out and sign someone else,after all the work theyve put into him..If theyre looking for another cb,which Lacombe claims they are,then what was the point in signing Kone ? Surely youd just sign 1 26 year old quality starting cb and be done with it,instead of beating around the bush with Kone the kid who your in 2 minds wether to nurture him for next season,or start him immediately. Im actually not keen on signing Diakite,as I just think of Diakhate,Sanchez would be nice though.

The reason is that Auxerre president Gérard Bourgoin is greedy, difficult to reach apparently being frequently away, and likes to make people feel he's the one who's got the power.
Aulas isn't ready to cave in and seems to consider his last offer was already very good, and with very little margin for improvement...

Ungh, if the Brest game hasn't convinced Aulas to buy a DM - be it N'dinga, Diarra, Diakite or Carlos Sanchez - than nothing will and we'll be in serious trouble. Gonalons just started looking very decent, but he's no superman to play 50+ games per season.
And this buying another CB - I don't get it. I'm really puzzled how Faure's name hasn't been mentioned at all in context of giving him a chance this season, and apparently he's France U20's best CB. Currently 6 CB's are on our pro group list: Faure, Seguin, Kone, Lovren, Mensah and Cris, with a possible 7th coming in. What a contrast to Puel's era when we barey had 3 CB's in the squad, with 2 of them regularly being injured.

I'm kind of inclined to hope they get Diakite or just sign Diarra on a one year deal. I would hate that they spend all that money on N'dinga and then have to lose money on an eventual sale, when Gonalons is looking pretty good and I think he should be given the chance to battle it out with a cheaper Diakhite or a free Diarra; I think N'dinga would def displace him.  I think that makes more sense in alot of ways.  

i believe that's the strategy - try to sign n'dinga for a reasonable fee, and if auxerre persists in gouging, sign diarra to a 1yr instead.  reports are diarra is continuing to train at T-V.
anyone else wish we hadn't let makoun go, now?   

Me not so much. Apparently he's already on his way out of Aston Villa after rare and not very good performances. Having him as a DM option I definitely don't miss. The 6M€ we cashed on Makoun now looks huge.
Bodmer is the one who I really miss after seeing his very good performances for one of our main competitors for the podium.

I don't miss Makoun at DM, but as a box-to-box MF going foward, definetly.  But then again, Makoun was only superb when he wanted out of OL and put on a show in his last few matches. Watching Bodmer at PSG, I feel it was a mistake letting him go. Shame we couldn't see him in the midfield for more than a handful of matches.  Anyway, you can partly thank Puel and over recruiting for both of their departures.

Unfortunately, missed yet another game. If you guys don't mind, can you tell me exactly where Belfodil played because I was under the impression that he was a striker.

He played on the right wing. The youth strikers tend to be used on the wings when they are subed-on. Lacazette, Tafer, and Belfodil always play on wings when they come on. I really can't think of an instance when one of them has played as a striker. I have missed alot of games, so I could be wrong.

In a lot of his under-19 games he was the "lone wolf" up front, and I remember Puel played him alongside Harry Novillo during the Peace Cup one or two seasons back. Was Pied not available, I would have thought it would make more sense to play pied on the wing and have Belfodil either start over Gomis/Licha, so they can rest, or come on as a sub. Belfodil is a great player, one to look out for in the future, but he is no Usain Bolt on the pitch, I think his height would give him a great advantage over defenders when a cross comes into the box.

Yes, he would have been better utilized in the center with Pied getting the nod , but as the wingers/smfs cover alot more ground, especially in the 4-4-2, then needed to be rested- as Megame mentions- and it was probably just Garde wanting Belfodil- maybe he's been doing better than Pied in practice- to get some playing time regardless of where he had to be placed. He did the same putting Pjanic on the other wing, and that didn't work out to well either. I was hoping that he'd slide over to striker later in the match, but we were down 1-0 so... 

He played on the right wing, while Pjanic was on the left. Garde wanted to rest his two wingers (Bastos and Briand) ahead of the return leg versus Kazan.

We don't have defense,our attacks are based on long ball,no tactics...only thing that is changed after Puel is that players are more happy.....Garde is not going to be here for long time...

Based on one game which we played with a 19 year old player, in a vital role, who's never played in L1 game before you're saying this? Puel's team would've bend over after a red card and lose the game 3-4 to 0. This team at least showed character to equalize and even try to go for the win after being a goal and a man down. This team HAS definitely changed basing on first few official games. People also forget we have almost no depth at all having our best talents stuck in Columbia.
I wasn't exactly pleased with this game, but if it wasn't for that red card we would've won it...cos Brest played their asses out in the first half to play shoulder to shoulder with us and it was clearly visible they have no juice left in the 2nd. Unfortunately Kone's inexperience cost us the 3 points. At least I hope Aulas will now splash the cash for a good DM.
ALLEZ LYONNAIS! ALLEZ REMI GARDE!

Not all Puel teams would give up so easily: remember that year we beat Real Madrid and we came out of the summer rolling over the competition. That team would claw their way back impressively, more than once ending up with draws or snatching victory from opponents late in the game- Liverpool comes immedeately to mind.
What you saw yesterday was one of  our "wonderful," yearly summer transfer lunacies coming back to bite us in the ass: last year we had to lose several matches because they wanted to turn Toul into a fulltime CB. In years past it was buying a 17yr old Kolo when Grosso went down, then eventually using Kallstrom as our only option, which cost us quite a bit. This year, we payed the price for not replacing Toul, and starting Kone in place of having Gonalons- who should be the real back-up DM- start.
Someone made the point that all our depth is still in Colombia. Virtually our entire second tier of players is out. We have no depth really. So that's a second factor.
But regardless, there's no way you can complain- this early- about Garde: We played damned well at Ajaccio and should have won that game 7-1 if it weren't for Ochoa and the goal post. Gomis, Bastos, and Licha are on fire, with Briand not to shabby. Our midfield- beside being decimated- is holding it's own considering what we have to work with: Gonalons and Kallstrom. Our CBs are kicking ass despite their young age, lack of time playing together, and the fact that Kone has never played at these high levels. In fact, our only weak point seems to be the sidebacks who are doing an atrocious job with marking and our defense on set-pieces of course.
We had a great first game, then fought back to take over and dominate the match vs. Kazan, and yesterday we came back to snatch the draw with 10 men, after a demoralising early goal- which was not the fault of our defense- all the while exhausted from midweek and with no second tier players to start the match. I think you need a quite few more matches before one can begin to draw comparisons.

what change???? we still play with avrege teams draw!! 2nd game in a row a draw! first Ajaccio, and now Brest! I dont see improving; sorry but I dont! maybe 3 games 3 wins, but 3 games 2 draw; sorry for me that is still going back, not forward

Did you even watch any of the games? We spanked Nice, Ajaccio and Rubin Kazan in such a manner Puel could've only dreamt about. Ajaccio was a really unfortunate draw for us, you can't say we played badly after hitting the woodwork 4 times and dominated heavily the entire game.
This was NEVER going to be an easy season for Remi Garde. He has practically been thrown into the wolves, into the season with no reinforcements but having our squad heavily depleted by departures of Toulalan and Delgado and our best young players, who usually serve as great depth, playing in U20 WC. Wow, come to think of it, probably any other rookie coach would've started the season with 4 losses instead in a manner Remi Garde started it. And the change in play and attitude is simply evident from these first few games. Anyone saying it's not, I'm not sure what games they've been watching. But this game was very unfortunate, from the start it was evident Brest players had lots of freshness, unlike us. It's not easy to chain league and CL games with such small depth. Still we didn't back down and we could've won this game very easily even with only 10 men, Brest were looking close to sinking in the last 20 minutes. I'm pretty positive if Kone didn't make that stupid foul and got substituted by Gonalons, we would've taken the three points.
Anyway, I think this is a great start for Remi Garde. And he still got lots to learn, so we can expect much better things in the future.

- All 2nd tier players providing depth are in Columbia.
- Gourcuff, Pjanic, Ederson, Cris, Mensah all injured for various matches. Pjanic, Cris & Mensa have played just 1 official match.
- Toulalan, Delgado departed with no replacements.
- Bastos, Cissoko, Lloris etc being bugged by transfer rumours.
- A new formation and tactics to adjust to for players.

Yet, Lyon have had a better start than Marseille & Lille and a much better start than last season when Lyon were in relegation zone. Judge Garde at the end of the season.

Also, be forgiving with Sidy Kone. He is very young. Judge his potential by what he did till the the fateful tackle. The recklessness can be eliminated with experience. I didn't see the whole match so cannot comment on his performance but everyone here seems willing to write him off based on just 1 tackle.

Well, that's it. Too many people are writing off Garde this early. And yet his results aren't bad at all considering all the set backs we've had so far.

Sidy Kone is definitely too young to get hung right now. It was his first L1 game ever. In couple of pre season friendlies he was actually pretty good for a player of his age. He was a bit unlucky for that red card to happen to him few seconds before the sub. If it wasn't for that and if we had won the game in the end (which seemed very possible even with 10 players) there would be no harm done from him and for him. Too bad, but that's a lesson learned for the kid. He has to move on and continue raising his game and confidence.

Completely agree

That's it, 1-1 final score. Disappointing game from Lyon

We don't particularly suffer from being down to 10, but our free flowing football isn"t there today, and Brest remain dangerous...

this is the worst game i have ever seen, these youth actually suck..

this is shit football

ugh - what happened??

can't find a link either ...

1-0 for Brest

Any links ?

Any links ?

Guys, it's getting more and more difficult to find streams sometimes, so I recommend to use one of the betting sites (I use bet365, but there are many others). You need to make a small deposit, and then you can watch good quality games freely.

 http://88.80.16.174/index.php?option=com_lsh&view=lsh&event_id=59436&tid=201364&channel=0&tmpl=component&layout=popup

Thank you

i didnt do you a favor, you were better off not watching this game... its scary how bad the youth are. S kone just got a red... its awful how bad they are..

There were only two youth players on. And these guys are very young and wouldn't be on under normal circumstances.