A brief History in “Classicos”….

By: Magnusson | September 2nd, 2007

Tonight, The Parc des Princes in Boulogne will host the “Classico” of the Championnat for the twenty ninth time since the 1971/1972 season. Marseille and Pparis are the two biggest cities in France, both demographically and footballistically. Their rivalries go far beyond the frontieres of the sport. Their rivalries epitomize an ancient problem in this country. Everything is centered around Paris. The aristocracy, the administrations, the economy, the wealth, the culture used to be here. So there has always been a defiance from Marseille to Paris at least on the sports tip. People from Paris don’t really like the marseillais and make fun of them for the accent, their reputation for exageration, their dirty city, the usual tackiness of their women and their pronounced taste for Pastis. The marseillais aren’t fond of parisians for a number of reasons but as a parisian, I’ll just spare myself…

The rivalry itself has not been between the players in a long time, granted some of them have been playing for both sides in their lives, they don’t have the same “enthusiasm” some players had (I remember Eric DiMeco Threatening some french national teammates of his -David Ginola namely- on the phone before a classico) before confrontations. Those days are over. Today, everything is between the fans.
The fact that Marseille and Paris have not been in the top 5 of thje Ligue 1 at the same time since 1994 explains the lack of passion and tension between players. Now the supporters of the ONLY two french clubs having won a European Cup tend to go at it even more. Apparently mediocrity in results increases violence or something because ever since marseille came back from second division there hasn’t been a year without some scuffles at some point in the season involving Paris and Marseille fans.
If we focus on the last ten years, Paris won five times at home (98/99, 00/01, 02/03, 03/04, 04/05), drew thrice (96/97, 01/02, and the special 05/06 “minots” team where we sent our amateur team there for security reasons; all those draws were 0-0 games) while Marseille only won three times in Paris. Since Marseille and Paris both won European Cups, the teams changed coaches a combined thirty times (I’m not saying thirty because it’s a big and ridiculous number, I’m saying thirty because it is the exact number: Marseille taking the cake with 17 different coaches).

Despite the lack of spectacle (let’s not count last year’s Ribery festival) PSG-OM is still, by far, the most watched game in french sports. It is the one game they have to move other television programs for, it’s the one game people go on weekends outisde the city for, it is the one game people will leave their car in their office parkings for, it’s the one game sports bars will close during. It’s the one rivalry people will write books about. In fact, it is so important that new french president Nicolas Sarkozy, a declared PSG fan (if you needed any more reason to hate the guy, here you go) switched some plans to be able to see it tonight in the Parc alongside Raymond Domenech.
It’s always interesting to see what happens but given how bad both teams have been playing lately, I wouldn’t expect a skill-fest. Although Marseille are pretty much obliged to do great tonight, Paris are trying to get their first positive result at home this season. We’ll see whose will is going to be the strongest. Albert Emon seemed particularly proud of himself last press conference, with a smile that was so mischevious people are thinking he knows something we don’t. Paul LeGuen did also seem pretty coinfident this morning. We’ll see what happoens.
One thing’s for sure, It won’t look anything like this!

This scene is taken out of the very popular french movie Didier
Here are the lineups:
Paris SG: Alonzo, Landreau – Armand, Mendy, Yepes, Bourillon, Camara – Arnaud, Chantôme, Clément, Diané, Digard, Gallardo, Ngoyi, Rothen – Pauleta, Luyindula, Frau.
Marseille: Mandanda, Hamel – Taiwo, Bonnart, Givet, Rodriguez, Faty, Zubar – Cana, Cheyrou, M´Bami, Nasri, Valbuena, Ziani, Gragnic – Moussilou, Niang, Zenden, Cissé, Arrache.
Let’s hope our argentinian jersey works for us.