On Saturday, Olympique de Marseille disappointed with a lacklustre performance away to FC Lorient (0-2) in Ligue 1. Following this worrying defeat, manager Habib Beye and director of football Medhi Benatia are coming under scrutiny.
The Olympique de Marseille players put in a performance that was quite simply disgraceful. Lacking in spirit, the Marseille side unsurprisingly lost to Lorient (0-2) at Le Moustoir on Saturday in Ligue 1. A defeat that is inevitably worrying in the race for the Champions League.
While the players were deeply disappointing, they are not the only ones bearing the brunt of the criticism…
Beye, an impact still waiting to materialise…
Appointed last February to succeed Roberto De Zerbi, manager Habib Beye is struggling to impress. In eight Ligue 1 matches in charge of OM, the Senegalese manager has a record of four wins and four defeats. No manager to arrive at Marseille mid-season has suffered so many defeats in so few matches since Albert Emon in 2002. Furthermore, in terms of the style of play his team produces, Beye is struggling to impose an attractive style of play.
“You can’t see a thing in the match,” declared RMC radio pundit Pascal Dupraz. “Yet, God knows Habib Beye tries to explain things to us. He explains them so much that I don’t understand a single thing. (…) I’m sorry to speak like this about a colleague. I shouldn’t, but it’s tiresome, especially as this colleague, when he was behind a microphone, never failed to tear us French managers to shreds – us who were so nervous and so timid, with hardly any ideas. Marseille are going in every direction except the right one.”
Benatia, a controversial outburst
At the same time, Medhi Benatia’s media outburst is also causing a stir (see article here). Following this defeat, the Olympique Marseille director of football made a notable outburst in the mixed zone. Whilst the substance of his remarks may be understandable, the manner in which they were delivered raises questions. For his part, former OM defender Bixente Lizarazu struggles to see the point of such an intervention with just four matches remaining in the season.
“Worrying? Yes. But I don’t think that sort of talk achieves anything. It’s the sort of thing you might hear from an angry fan leaving a match. There are four games left to play; we could still qualify for the Champions League. This club needs some calm; that’s what’s missing – there are always crises and problems. And the players are constantly under pressure. It’s a bit like a lemon: if you keep squeezing it, there’s no juice left. A sense of calm could help them finish the season strongly; the objective is still within reach,” emphasised the Téléfoot pundit. After all, whatever the results this Sunday, Marseille are guaranteed to remain two points behind third place…
OM: Benatia’s high-profile return to the limelight
Furious at the attitude displayed by Olympique de Marseille’s players against Lorient (0-2) on Saturday in Ligue 1, director of football Medhi Benatia has launched a massive rant. Having remained silent since February, the Moroccan has banged his fist on the table.
Medhi Benatia could not contain his anger. Since last February, however, the director of football at Olympique de Marseille had been very low-key in the media. Following his resignation and subsequent return until the end of the season, the Moroccan had decided to focus on the sporting side of things.
But on Saturday, the disgraceful performance by Habib Beye’s men on the pitch at Lorient (0-2) in Ligue 1 prompted the former centre-back to break his silence…
Benatia, a massive outburst!
Furious, Benatia turned up in the mixed zone and let rip at the Marseille players. “I hadn’t planned on speaking again until the end of the year because I felt we’d talked far too much in the first six months, and whatever you say, you’re bound to be wrong – inevitably, after results like that, you can only be wrong. However, as I explained to the players, when you’re here, you always feel a sense of responsibility. I’ve got no problem with that. If people say I brought in a manager for a project that was supposed to last three years and who has unfortunately left, that’s fine. If people say that the players we brought in, who were very good in September, have become very poor, I’ve got no problem with that either. If they say I’ve brought in a new coach who isn’t any good either, I accept that,” said the OM director by way of introduction.
“But when I see the match that took place today, even though I don’t feel like talking anymore, I have to face the press. Because it’s a scandal, it’s a scandal. You’re up against a team that’s practically on holiday – a very good football team, certainly, but one that’s almost on holiday. You’re normally playing the first of your five finals. We go on training camps, it costs us money, because you want to work hard, you want to get back together, you want to build team spirit with the lads because that’s what’s been missing, and in your opinion, how many of them went back into the dressing room and turned the table over? Zero, nobody. Everything’s spotless, the bottles are all in place, all that sort of thing,” he railed, before continuing.
“You play for Olympique de Marseille, you have a game like that and you accept it. And some people might think that we’re just accepting it; I imagine the manager, like all managers these days—it’s the trend—will take the blame and then we’ll move on… (…) The same criticisms keep going round and round. What are we talking about? Guts, self-respect, respect for the shirt we wear, respect for people. And what do we actually do? On a 40-metre cross, am I the one who goes for it? On a second ball, am I the one who goes for it? When you lose the ball in transition, even though that’s all we did in training, what do you do? You lose the ball, and you just watch it. But you can’t pull the wool over my eyes. “When you’re playing Lorient, who have nothing left to play for, at 5pm, and you don’t win a single challenge, you don’t make a single run forward, you’re not proactive, you don’t try anything,” listed Benatia, outraged by certain attitudes.
And now?
Following a training camp in Marbella that clearly proved fruitless this week, Marseille are likely to tighten the screws for this final sprint after their very poor performance at Lorient. As they prepare to host OGC Nice next Sunday, the Olympians can expect to spend the week at La Commanderie… “But as I have a responsibility I promised the boss, who asked me to come back, to give my all right up to the very last day, I’ve told them not to make any plans for the next four weeks. We’re going to spend a bit more time together at La Commanderie. If we have to spend the four weeks together, we’ll spend the four weeks together; I’ve got no problem with that. We’ll spend the mornings and afternoons there, we’ll work, have a good nap in between, and we’ll get on with it,” assured Benatia.
“It’s simply to explain to the players that, if they think anyone at the club has given up, we’ll show them we’re ready to spend every single day at La Commanderie, every day – that’s what we owe it to ourselves. There are people who turn up for work at 7am, leave at 7pm and don’t earn what we earn. So, if it’s to rile them up a bit, to give things a bit of a boost, and spending time together does us good, then we’ll do it; I’ve no problem with that,” concluded the Marseille player. Is this a sufficient wake-up call to reignite OM, currently fourth in the table, in the race for the Champions League?
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