Champions League, Group Stage (R)

[MetroChile]

I figured it would be easier/more organized to discuss all of l'OM CL's ongoings on one thread. :)

[SportBoy333]

Well they did submit their Champion's League roster:

L'UEFA a officialisé vendredi la liste des joueurs de l'Olympique de Marseille inscrits pour disputer la Ligue des Champions 2009-2010. Didier Deschamps a retenu 21 joueurs, plus huit jeunes sur la liste B. En voici la liste : Mandanda, Andrade, Kouakbi (B) - Taiwo, Rodriguez, Hilton, Heinze, Diawara, Rool, Bonnart, Bocaly (B), Mbow (B), D'Ulivo (B) - Cissé, Cheyrou, Lucho, Ben Arfa, Kaboré, Mbia, Abriel, Valbuena, Osei (B), Ndoumbou (B) - Brandao, Niang, Koné, Morientes, J. Ayew (B), Gnabouyou (B).

[zizouForlife]

tomorrow begins our quest to european glory

[Robdog]

tomorrow begins our quest to european glory

I am soo ready!!!

[StarrMatthieu]

as a psg fan i wish your l'om fans alot of luck!!! i hope a win for marseille and for france! we need to beat acmilan good luck

[zizouForlife]

wow the atmosphere looks fantastic

[Robdog]

Inzaghi was offside on the goal :mad:

[usnroach]

yes he was....since the goal intensity has been picked up and marseille are playing beautiful attacking football. first time really watching marseille is a great pleasure.

[usnroach]

wow the atmosphere looks fantastic

yes very intimidating...would be alot of fun!!!

[MetroChile]

One could kinda tell it would be a "weird" game once Heinze scored. :( :o

[SportBoy333]

Cheyrou was the best OM player. He really should be getting Les Bleus call ups. Brandao was very non exsistant. I think the main problem other than the bad weather was that Milan is a veteran team and practically half of OM were new players. They still dominated the 2nd half and now that they didnt get no points it will be so hard to advance now.

[Robdog]

Brandao was very non existent.

I don't. I remember Brandão causing many problems for the Milan backline. On one occasion he jumped up for the ball and was promptly pulled down in front of the box by Nesta. The replays showed that Nesta had a hold of Brandão jersey. A foul should have been called, but like the first goal, the ref ignored it:rolleyes:

[guignol]

hard lines for OM. now they're condemned to getting points off of real AND winning at san siro. a pity because they were just as good as milan in the first half and miles better in the second. if not for that pippo frigging inzaghi :mad: - i've never seen a player that one dimensional, but when that dimension is genius...

when you're in your fifties and still trying to chug around football fields you can identify with the rossoneri (not that i do). they can get played right off the field and still win because if football is an athletic game it's not all about being athletic*.

outside of L1 and european cups i don't watch as much football as most of you so maybe someone can clue me in: what's the deal about pato? isn't he supposed to be really good? did i miss something?

can you imagine the scene between flamini and gattusso in the changing room after the match? "father, today i am a man".

deschamps seems a pretty good judge of horseflesh: he said lucho wasn't the messiah... he's right!

wow the atmosphere looks fantasticcomme d'hab, and all the more impressive because of the elements. 20 years the city fathers can't be bothered to get the vélo covered but at least they laid out free ponchos arranged in marseille's coat or arms.

Inzaghi was offside on the goal yes, but very slightly, and no defender had even seen him; for me it's a good goal.

Cheyrou was the best OM player. after niang you mean! but you're right, based on that match he should get called up.

Brandao was very non existant.perhaps a bit harsh, but he better be hoping L1 defenders were all busy last night, if they saw how easy it is to shut him down by turning his own punk tricks against him his career will take a severe downturn.

*my buds and i put a group of smartass kids (ours :D) in their place sunday and let me tell you it's sweet!

[SportBoy333]

M'Bia and Kabore had bad games. If Bonnart and Cana were out there instead then who knows. I didnt see Brandao do anything with the ball when he had it. He was pulled but he didnt show me anything. You need Lucho to play all 90 min. in order to win a game like this.

[guignol]

i didn't think much of kaboré or m'bia either, nor cissé, but you have to admit that they did much better than hold their own collectively.

still, when JPP says this is the strongest team french football has ever put together you start putting away all the sharp instruments. the man is clearly clinically insane.

[prvev]

We were somewhat unlucky to lose, but...oh well. We had chances, and there were certainly promising aspects to the performance, but we don't have a player like an Inzaghi whose sole purpose for living is to score goals. Brandao does well against small teams, in terms of making them pay for a decent number of their mistakes, and against stronger clubs he does a somewhat effective job of annoying the shit out of the opposition. But in these games against tougher opponents, we'll likely need goals from the likes of Lucho and Mamad, and unfortunately those didn't come last night. There were certainly signs that they will, at some point, come. Which is good. But it doesn't erase the fact that last night's loss likely just about puts us out of the Champions League, barring a few huge performances.

I'd have liked to seen Valbuena instead of Cisse, but I can understand what Deschamps was doing. We're really going to miss Kone during this stretch. Also, I don't quite get why Bocaly doesn't get a chance on the right, as it's pretty clearly not Kabore's best position.

[SportBoy333]

All the reports I saw had predictied Abriel would start and he didnt even play. Morientes is OM's Inzaghi, a crafty veteran who can poach goals and maybe he should play more than just 10 min. OM has to intergrate too many new players and you cant expect success with that this early on.

[prvev]

I agree to some extent, on both points. Though I'm not sure Morientes really is physically capable of playing very much at this point, I think giving him a token 10 minutes at the end of the game is a bit useless. And, yes, it was always going to be somewhat difficult to get everything working "properly", and so we do have to give it some time. Unfortunately, the way the fixtures worked out in the Champions League didn't really give us any time.

[zak13]

don't worry we'll qualify in 8 we have a strong team and lucho is going to find the level and arfa ben also

[guignol]

Morientes is OM's Inzaghi...as much as i always liked fernando and have never been able to stand pippo i have to admit morientes has never been more than a poor man's inzaghi

OM has to integrate too many new players and you cant expect success with that this early on.no more than OL :rolleyes:... besides, the hardest to get clicking is the charnière centrale, and hard to have complaints there!

lucho is going to find the level and arfa ben alsolucho? i think you're right. HBA? we thought the same for FIVE YEARS.