Ligue 1 round-up: 3ème Journée

 

What a weekend of football! We saw lots of goals, red cards (that’s now an astonishing 15 for the season) and best of all PSG dropping points and Marseille winning - shame the game was an absolute shocker. We will start this weekend's round-up in Paris where PSG were booed from the pitch as they failed to win yet again against Bordeaux. PSG look like a team void of ideas which seems a bizarre thing to say when you look at the quality they have. Ibrahimovic looked isolated and PSG never really looked liked troubling Bordeaux’s three centre backs. Things won’t get any easier for PSG as they travel to Lille next week in search of their first win of the season! Bordeaux however remain unbeaten and move up to fourth place.

PSG weren’t the only title hopefuls to drop points, as both Lyon and Lille were both held to draws. Lyon travelled to nearby neighbours Evian, and fell behind early in the second half to a classy Barbosa finish. But Michel Bastos was at it again, scoring a cracking free kick to rescue a point for the Lyonnais. Lille, however, will be quietly pleased with their point away at Nice, as they rested key players before their must win Champions League clash this week. Nice were very unlucky not to take all three points as they were continuously denied by the heroics of Lille keeper, Landreau. 

Check out Landreau's inspired performance and Nice's lovely team goal:

Bastos scores another cracker: 

The big clash of the weekend saw defending champions Montpellier take on Marseille at the Stade de la Mosson. Now on Sunday afternoon, after I had eaten my Sunday lunch, I had the difficult task of choosing what game to watch - Marseille or Liverpool Man City? I chose Marseille and don’t get me wrong I was thrilled with the result but my God what a boring match. I was half asleep when Gignac grabbed the winner, and that goal only came about after some incredibly poor defending from Montpellier. This was a top of the table and clash and even the commentators sounded bored....I don't know.... maybe the heat had a part to play but this was not a good advert for Ligue 1 football. What makes it worse was that at the same time I was missing out on a thrilling 2-2 draw between Liverpool and Man City. Enough said. Anyway, the good news is that Marseille are now top of the league with three wins out of three and Gignac is on fire. It looks like he's got rid of his McDonald's loyalty card and now actually looks like a footballer. I'm sure it wont be long before the Marseille fans will be singing  Feed the Gignac and he will score. Happy days for us Marseille fans. The same can't be said for Montpellier who look short on ideas and I just don’t know where they are going to get their goals from this season because Herrera is just awful.

Elsewhere, Toulouse continued their good form with a 1-0 win away at Nancy, Sissoko getting the only goal. St. Etienne finally kick started their season with an impressive home win over Brest. Aubameyang got two goals in this one and my word this boy can run. I rate him a lot and he will be pivotal to St Etienne’s season. In another game full of goals, Stade Rennais beat Bastia 3-2. This could well have been M’Vila’s last game for the club with Tottenham submitting an offer believed to be in the region of 12 million pounds for the midfielder. The two promoted sides Troyes and Reims both got off the mark this weekend. Troyes held ten men Lorient to a 2-2 draw and Reims scored a last minute winner to condemn Sochaux to their third successive defeat. And finally, Ajaccio, who played so well against PSG last week, were comprehensively beaten 3-0 by Valenciennes. 

Saint-Etienne hammer Brest 4-0:

On another note, I’m thinking of starting a petition to stop Barton from signing for Marseille. Horrible man, horrible player, don’t want him anywhere near our great club.  What do you think Marseille fans?

Barton says his heart is already in the Velodrome....I bloody hope not. 

Week 3

Paris Saint-Germain 0 - 0  Girondins de Bordeaux

Montpellier Hérault SC 0 - 1  Olympique de Marseille

AS Saint-Etienne  4 - 0  Stade Brestois 29

OGC Nice 2 - 2  LOSC Lille

Stade Rennais FC 3 - 2  SC Bastia

Stade de Reims 1 - 0  FC Sochaux-Montbéliard

Valenciennes FC 3 - 0  AC Ajaccio

AS Nancy Lorraine 0 - 1  Toulouse FC

ESTAC Troyes  2 - 2 FC Lorient 

Evian TG FC  1 - 1  Olympique Lyonnais

Ligue 1 - 2ème Journée

111 111 111

Those more observant will have noticed the phrase at the top of this blog’s page; "French football with an English twist", what this basically means is that every now and again I will be writing a few lines venting my frustrations about Norwich City. This weekend marked the opening day of the Premier League season, and every year at this point I’m filled with hope and excitement for the season ahead. This hope was dully crushed by Fulham of all teams, as Norwich slumped to a 5-0 defeat. We were truly awful, abysmal even, managing just two shots on target all game. I don't know what Hughton has been doing all pre-season but the whole team looked like they were still on holiday and this season looks over before its even started. Yes I’m a massive pessimist but I think relegation is very much on the cards. Right, rant over and time to look at the results on the sunnier side of the channel.

It is only fair to start the round-up at Lille as they marked a momentous moment in their history with the opening of their magnificent new stadium, the Grand Stade Lille Metropole. The 50,000 seater stadium is state of the art and boasts the first retractable roof in France and Lille finally have a stadium worthy of their ambitions. Unfortunately Lille were unable to christen the stadium with a victory as they were held to a one all draw by a plucky AS Nancy side, ex Chelsea star Salomon Kalou grabbing the equaliser for the les Lillois.

Highlights:

Lyon however made easy work of newly promoted side Troyes. A brace from Gomis helped Lyon on their way to a thumping 4-1 victory, but the goal of the game came from Brazilian Michel Bastos who scored a spectacular overhead kick from the edge of the area. That’s two wins out of two for Lyon, the only negative coming as Gourcuff limped off early in the first half.

Bastos' spectacular overhead kick:

Defending champions Montpellier are having a nightmare start to their season, as they went down 2-1 away at Lorient. In fact they led for most of the game after Herrera opened the scoring in the 36th minute, but they never looked comfortable and Lorient dominated for large periods of the match. Lorient were finally rewarded with two goals in stoppage time sealing an astonishing comeback. It was that man Jérémie Aliadière again who got the winner. That’s two goals in two games for him now and Lorient have taken 4 points from PSG and from the reigning champions.

Highlights:

So what of PSG? Well they failed to win again! They were held to an nil-nil draw away at Ajaccio which saw Lavezzi sent off and Ancelotti sent to the stands. PSG were without Ibrahimovic but even with all their other talents they never really threatened apart from Menez missing an absolute sitter from 4 yards out. I know its early days but could PSG be over reliant on Ibra? One man team….surely not.

Marseille moved four points clear of bitter rivals PSG with a comfortable 2-0 win at home to Sochaux. This game was postponed by three hours to avoid the intense Mediterranean heat!  If only England suffered from the same problem. But when the game finally got underway the OM were far too strong for Sochaux and goals from Gignac and Fanni sealed the three points. I’ve been really impressed with Gignac so far this season and I think he’s back to his best after the problems of last season. I’ve backed him at 22-1 to be top scorer this season….As for Sochaux that’s two defeats on the trot and next weekends game against Ligue 1 new boys Reims is a must win game.

Highlights:

Elsewhere Bordeaux extended their Ligue 1 wining streak to 8 games with a 1-0 win over Rennes and Bastia came out on top in battle of the promoted teams, beating Reims 2-1. A great start to the season for the Corsican club. Saint Etienne’s poor start to the season continued as they went down 2-1 away at Toulouse with highly rated Ben Yedder and Capoue getting the goals for Toulouse. There was also a first win for Stade Brestois and Valenciennes and Nice shared the spoils in a nil-nil draw at the Stade du Hainaut.