It is when you touch the bottom of the pool that you are supposed to rise to the surface. After a terrible tumble over the course of 2021, Olympique Lyonnais can only cling to this popular wisdom before facing PSG, Sunday January 9, as part of the 20e Ligue 1 football day. And hope that 2022 will be that of renewal.
Repeated sports failures, disagreement within the management of the club, sports sanctions following incidents involving spectators from Lyon (disqualification from the Coupe de France, point withdrawn from the classification in Ligue 1)… The list of wounds which fell down on Lyon looks like a biblical accumulation. In 2021, nothing will have been spared President Jean-Michel Aulas, who is perhaps going through the most difficult period at the head of a club he has led since 1987.
This annus horribilis should be placed in a particular context, which marks a certain downgrading of the Rhone club. The boom years – those when the club chained the titles and impressed – are only a distant memory. Olympique Lyonnais has been chasing a trophy since winning the Coupe de France in 2012.
Opportunities to rejoice exist, but they are rather rare: qualifying for the European Cup, a semi-final of the Europa League in 2017 and an unexpected journey in 2020 to a semi-final of the Champions League thanks in particular to a format shortened due to Covid-19.
A series of poor performances
This promising European campaign resulted in a failed 2020-2021 season. Unqualified in the European Cup, focused mainly on the championship, Lyon was unable to achieve its priority goal: a place in the Champions League. This failure was sanctioned by a final defeat at home against the Niçois (3-2) on the last day of Ligue 1, in May 2021.
More in the odor of sanctity, coach Rudi Garcia left the club at the end of his contract. The hope of a renewal was embodied in the choice of the new coach, the Dutchman Peter Bosz, who this time was fully that of the sporting director, Juninho.
After a very poor start in Ligue 1 at the start of the 2021-2022 season, quickly corrected by an encouraging month of September, the poor performance followed one another. Often with absurd scenarios and many goals conceded at the end of the game.
In Nice, on October 24, the Gones led 2-0 ten minutes from time before sinking by conceding three goals. A match in the form of a negative turn from which the Bosz players never seem to have recovered. At the Christmas break, yet another draw at home (against Metz, 1-1) left them at an incongruous 13e place (22 points behind the leader, PSG), far from the initial objectives.
The almost perfect group stage in the Europa League (5 wins and 1 draw) was not enough to erase this crisis. The round of 16 scheduled for March against a team still undetermined will be one of the last real goals of the season.
Heavy penalties after incidents in the stands
The year 2021 will also have been that of the divorce between President Aulas and Juninho. After just two years as sporting director, the former Brazilian glory of the 2000s laid down their arms in December. Tired of power struggles within the club, especially with the director of football, manager Vincent Ponsot.
Marked by the failure of his first trainer in 2019, the beginner Silvinho – who was, in his defense, not his first choice but constrained by financial restrictions – the man from Pernambuco (Brazil) never succeeded to obtain the autonomy he demanded to carry out his sports policy. The refusals he was opposed to have an assistant or to strengthen the recruitment unit of OL are the most significant examples.
Choppy behind the scenes, the end of the year was not more serene on the outside. The image of Jean-Michel Aulas’ club suffered from two incidents involving some of his supporters. The Lyonnais were severely punished: a penalty point and two games behind closed doors in the league after the incidents during a match against Marseille, on November 21, during which the Marseillais Dimitri Payet had received a bottle on the head; disqualification in the Coupe de France after incidents that occurred on December 17 during the match of 32es final against Paris FC, but also a parking ban for all away matches until the end of the season.
The Lyon president kept a low profile following the decision of the FFF disciplinary committee and refused to appeal.
At the very beginning of the year, one last bad news has darkened this state of affairs. The progression of the Omicron variant has led the government to impose a gauge of 5,000 spectators, from January 3 to 24, in the stadiums. This decision is fraught with consequences: two of the best recipes of the season will slip away under OL’s nose, that of the match against PSG, but also that of the derby against Saint-Etienne on January 21. Ticket office losses amount to several million euros.
Until the last moment, Lyon tried to obtain a proportional gauge of 20,000 spectators, that is to say a third of the capacity of its stadium. Without success. The only good news is that Peter Bosz can count on the majority of his players. Those who had been affected by the Covid-19, like its Brazilian star Lucas Paqueta, will be back against the Parisians. Will this be enough to obtain a prestigious victory and start a sporting renaissance?