Représente ta ligue: Forget the League, OM’s Gunning for the European Championship

By: Sam | September 18th, 2007

Eight matches in Ligue 1 and only one win to show for it? Pish posh. They can lose against Valenciennes and Nice, but their ain’t no way Marseille were going to lose against a club whose name has two “S cédilles” (French grammar joke there). It took them a while, but the Marseillais got their thing together and beat their Turkish challenger, Bes,iktas,, by two goals to nil.

Desperately seeking the faintest sliver of happiness after losing at home once again to Toulouse on the weekend, a draw would’ve been more than enough against a side that boasted two former Ligue 1 stalwarts in Édouard Cissé and Lamine Diatta. But really, come on. Is Marseille going to lose at home to a bunch of dudes who suit up players with numbers 41, 58 and 84? No, not really.

The first goal, also known as the crowbar that pried the monkey off everyone’s back, came on 76 minutes through central defender Julien Rodriguez, who found himself all alone and simply cracked it home into the gaping net after Samir Nasri’s corner kick hit the far post directly. The Turks almost score after that, but it would be Djibril Cissé who barrelled down the middle of the pitch just after regular time and poked the ball past Arikan to the short side.

Woo.

Said Albert Emon, OM’s manager, after the match (translated from French): It’s a Champions League match, we won it through intelligence and a collective will in our players. It was a great match, perhaps Marseille’s best this season yet. I felt lots of determination and concentration.

Said Ertugrul Saglam, Bes,iktas,’ manager (translated from Turkish): We weren’t expecting that result tonight. We wanted a win to kick off the Champions League, but if you look at our play, there’s not many positive things to say.

After Liverpool and Porto couldn’t figure each other out and drew one apiece, guess who’s on top of the Group A table…

Lyon vs. Barcelona tomorrow… Check out what Inara has to say about that here!