It is a historic victory. Olympique de Marseille put an end to 44 years of defeat in the league in Bordeaux by winning 1 to 0, Friday January 7, on the ground of the Girondins (17es) very weakened by the Covid-19, in the opening match of the 20e Ligue 1 day played behind closed doors.
OM temporarily seizes second place, ten points behind PSG who play Sunday in Lyon, and three lengths in front of Nice, traveling to Brest, also on Sunday. Turkish striker Cengiz Under scored the only goal of the game in the 37e minute taking advantage of a poor recovery from the Bordeaux goalkeeper, Benoît Costil.
The Girondins had requested the postponement of the match, advancing 17 positive cases for Covid-19 within the team, but the Professional Football League (LFP) had only taken into account 8, considering the others as cured. However, it takes three times as many affected players for a meeting to be postponed. A blow for the club which had already been refused a postponement to the return of the Christmas holidays: the French Football Federation had forced him to play the round of 16 of the Coupe de France in Brest (lost 0 to 3) , despite 23 absent in its ranks (including 21 tested positive for Covid-19).
This Friday against OM, the LFP had however granted several exemptions to the Girondins, which allowed Costil to start, and Fransérgio and Yacine Adli to return during the match. But it was not enough.
Bordeaux lacking rhythm
The dominance of Jorge Sampaoli’s men was unchallenged most of the time against visibly tired Bordelais. Except that the Marseillais’ attempts were too far away or not sufficiently framed to worry Costil, saved by his post on a recovery from Duje Caletar-Car following a corner from Dimitri Payet deflected with the head by Boubacar Kamara (11e).
Then there is this return to six meters unsuccessful by the Bordeaux goalkeeper directly on the Turkish left-handed off-center, which marks his 7e goal of the season on the 5the in L1.
This will be the only mistake of the international goalkeeper who will then have been vigilant in the recovery on a header from Caleta-Car (52nd), a furious rush and a dry strike from Matteo Guendouzi (55) and finally who will be the winner of his face-to-face. -face with Ünder (62e), then later in front of Dimitri Payet or Guendouzi.
In lack of rhythm with six “ex-covids” lined up from the start, Vladimir Petkovic’s men ran a lot, suffered a lot, only really approaching Pau Lopez’s cage once before the break, but Hwang Ui-jo, ideally launched by Tom Lacoux, saw his left strike fly away.
In the wake of Issouf Sissokho more than up to the intensity, there was better in their production after the break. Mexer from a corner (47), Hwang not sufficiently clinical at five meters (69) will have had two situations to equalize and preserve this invincibility. They did not succeed, leaving Marseille to end L1’s most media-friendly period of invincibility.
