How to break a thirty-year curse…

By: Magnusson | September 12th, 2008

It’s been thirty one years since the last time we won against Bordeaux. The 1977-1978 season to be exact and since then we lost 17 times and drew Bordeaux 5 times on their home turf. There’s no way their official title of “Bete Noire” is far from being exagerated.
Even though we’ve managed to bring a point from Chaban-Delmas every year for three seasons now, Bordeaux still remains one of those clubs that we never perform well against.
It’s been a long two weeks since the last time we played in Ligue 1. The international break has been pretty rough on some of our internationals and their return will e a well deserved rest in terms of criticism at least for most of them.

Steve Mandanda for one. The kid was one great game away from being declared “Santo Subito” after the Sweden game and some Hugo Lloris supporters started shooting on sight since the Austria defeat. If Mandanda remains cool as ice, we can’t help but wonder how he’s taking the first critics of his very short career. He showed how he can bounce back by single-handedly restauring confidence in his teammates on wednesday. But now that he’s back home, “Il Phenomeno” (That’s how he’s being called these days in the Vélodrome.) will enjoy the perks of being considered a Man amongst men in his own club.

For Hatem Ben Arfa, it has been a messy two weeks where after a groin injury that kept him from going to Clairefontaine and training with the National Team, he resumed training this morning only to get hurt on his knee on Tuesday, leaving him highly uncertain for tomorrow’s game.

As for Julien Rodriguez and Mathieu Valbuena, the two – now- veterans are back and totally fine since they participated properly to the training sessions. If it doesn’t make the shadow of a doubt that Mathieu Valbuena will be playing at some point of the game against his childhood team and some of his best friends, Julien Rodriguez could come back to his spot way sooner than expected.
Gerets was pretty clear about his little wizard (the original one, not Baky). The belgian technician told the press this morning during the press ocnference that:

“If Mathieu shows us the same qualities he showed us last season and during the preparation matches we played before his injury ,not to mention during practice, when he comes on on Saturday, it’s going to be impossible for me not to include him on the team pretty soon (i.e. against Liverpool next week)”

The main problem for Gerets to solve will be to decide who will be his playmaker tomorrow. Valbuena but also Ziani and Ben Arfa can pretend to be leading us there but Ziani for the moment is the favorite since the Algerian was tremendous in his country’s win against Senegal, not to mention how he’s been playing since the season started. Marseille needed him good and healthy this season and he’s yet to disappoint.

All in all, Marseille will have to be extra focused tomorrow and to have their minds in Bordeaux and nowhere else. The biggest mistake for both teams will be to think about either Chelsea or Liverpool. If they do then they’ll regret it deeply. This game is of course supposed to be the highlight of the weekend with great technical players facing each other. Let’s just hope Gourcuff is still exhausted by his incredible performance agaisnt Serbia.

Here is the group for tommorow’s game:
Keepers: Mandanda, Riou
Defense: Bonnart, Erbate, Zubar, Taiwo, Mears, Hilton
Midfield: Cheyrou, Kaboré, Cana, M’Bami, Ziani, Valbuena, Zenden, Ben Arfa
Attack : Niang, Grandin, Koné, Samassa

In my humble opinion, this could be one of the greatest matches so far this season or both teams could be playing with the brakes on just to make sure no one gets hurt and have their minds already on next week’s bouts. That would then be a snoozefest. As for viewing options, if you’re in France, either you’re insanely rich and have Orange Sports or you’ll be at some pub, or you’ll be watching it online.

Peace