Catch-up time…

By: Magnusson | August 31st, 2008

A lot has happened this week. It’s pretty much time to get y’all updated on what is going on at the Commanderie real quick.

Mamadou Samassa is signed to a four-year deal.

Ever since the two norwegians Fredrik Stromstad and Thorstein Helstad arrived at Le Mans, Samassa was relegated to the bench by Coach Yves Bertucci. The french U21 international decided to come to “finish his progression” and to “get a chance at being a starter”. Okay…

I don’t like to criticize recruiting beeforehand but I just feel we’re getting guys just to get them. If we wanted a fifth wheel to come in and finish games as a striker, we could’ve kept either Dédé Ayew or Salim Arrache. Mamadou Samassa is a name we’ve kept hearing for a long time because he was pegged as one of the next few greats, kinda like Jimmy Briand. But I don’t see how a guy like him could do better here than at Le Mans. Mind you he’s scored 4 goals in two seasons (43 games) as a full member of the professional Le Mans team. That’s less than Taiwo. And he’s a striker. But hey! José Anigo’s recruiting has been 50/50 so far so we’ll see quickly enough how well he fits in the team and how well he learns from Niang and Koné.
With his size, Samassa could be an asset if Gerets uses him well. He could be the ideal pivot for the other strikers as he was for De Mello.

Toifilou Maoulida is a class act…

The Marseille native and ex-Marseille player Toifilou Maoulida proved once more why people wherever he goes love him. The current Lens player, who decided to stay there in spite of offers from a few clubs that stayed in the Ligue1, scored a double on Monday night against Nimes in a 1-2 victory and twice, he busted out his traditionnal bandage message dedicating both his goals to the deceased Marseille fans (”Hommage aux supporters Marseillais”). Let’s hope Toifilou has a great season and that Lens comes back to Ligue 1 as soon as possible.

Marseille qualifies for the Champions League…

In a very heavy atmosphere, Marseille came back to the Vélodrome while still mourning the loss of two of its supporters during the fatal bus accident on Saturday morning. As the whole Vélodrome was in communion with the MTPs, Marseille still had the relatively reasonable task of beating Norwegian side Brann Bergen at home after winning there 1-0.

Well, the Brann game was everything but simple. The only thing worth remembering about that game is that Marseille went through and qualified for the Champions League. We played too much like a team wanting to save the advantage earned during the first leg. We can also add the fact that some players may still have been a little emotional themselves but hopefully that was it. Because what a pitiful spectacle it was on our part. Brann Bergen is a very limited team, full of very courageous yet technically limited players (some noteable exceptions are of course gambian midfielder Demba Nyren) that could do well in the second-tier of the Ligue 1 and at some point we were playing as if they were Lyon. And even against Lyon, we play with some type of ambition. That was not the case wednesday. Aside from Steve Mandanda and Hatem Ben Arfa , the team was hard to recognize.

And what a Mamadou Niang! Damn, the kid is focused these days and it seems as though he was genuinely saddened and suprised when he heard through the press that Djibril was leaving before he called him to announce the news, Mamadou Niang steps up once more and scores twice in a very tough match-up against the Bran defense.

…And draws heavyweights.
In the wake of the qualification, everybody was glued to their Tvs waiting for the Champions League draws and boy were we not disappointed. I know the right thing to say is that the Champions League is the Champiuons League and that they’re no small teams and bla, bla, bla. Yes but still, the french clubs were not the luckiest in this draw.

First we drew Liverpool, then PSV Eindhoven and Atletico Madrid to finish it off. When I aw our group, my first reaction was to echo that of Sam: “Good Christ Almmighty”. BUt then again, we fought for this and you may never know.
It’s back to Anfield for us again this year. Here are the groups.
A : Chelsea, Roma, Bordeaux, Cluj
B : Inter, Werder, Panathinaikos, Famagouste
C : Barcelone, Sporting Lisbonne, Bale, Shakhtar
D : Liverpool, PSV, OM, Atletico Madrid
E : Manchester, Villareal, Celtic, Aalborg
F : Lyon, Bayern, Bucarest, Fiorentina
G : Arsenal, Porto, Fenerbahce, Kiev
H : Real, Juventus, Zenit, Bate

Lyon still is a favorite in their group and I hope to see them advance further this year. As for Bordeaux and us, it will all rest on our respective positions at the time and what the objective will be at the time. But both teams can come out of these groups if they are lucky enough.
We finished the week with a home game against Sochaux. It was also a heart stopper, Mandanda confirming his status as a world-class keeper. More on that later today.