OM-PSG: a clasico under very high tension

We thought that the coronavirus had leveled our passions and our Sunday night outbursts.

It was certain that the absence of an audience had profoundly altered the very essence of the sports spectacle.

We especially thought that the clasico was dead with the advent of PSG version Qatar and its presumptuous domination during one-sided confrontations.

And then we changed our mind.

This Sunday, all football enthusiasts, and perhaps even beyond, wish to attend the 100th meeting between OM and PSG.

Canal +, before seizing all of Ligue 1 until the end of the season, came out of its lair to put 3 million euros on the table and broadcast this summit of the championship.

Suddenly, the clasico became again the flammable material that made the honey of commentators in the 90s.

Pochettino tries to procrastinate

Because it is indeed at the end of the last century that the memories bring us back when it comes to establishing a parallel between the OM-PSG of the evening and those of yesteryear.

Let’s not kid ourselves.

The animosity between the two clubs was not suddenly draped in a newfound sporting rivalry.

PSG - "the best team in France" insisted Saturday Alessandro Florenzi, the Parisian defender - evolves in spheres that no Marseille field player can hope to familiarize with.

But the deep antagonisms resurfaced last September following a victory for OM (1-0) in the first leg and a deeply deleterious climate against a background of accusations of racism by Neymar against Alvaro, spitting from Di Maria and a series of mandals at the very end of the meeting.

Aware that the emotional management of this type of situation is not the greatest strength of his group, Mauricio Pochettino tries to reduce the event to a quest for success necessary not to win in the league.

“What we want is to win, recalled the PSG coach, face closed, as upset.

Obviously, there were problems just after the Champions Trophy (PSG 2-1 victory over OM on January 13).

But our responsibility is to win and not to generate an atmosphere where football comes last. ”

The #Classico resumes its rights on @canalplus 🙌 # OMPSG to be experienced this Sunday at 9 p.m. LIVE on CANAL + 📺⏰

Discover the essential stats to know with the 100th Classico in history 📊

The @ Ligue1UberEats is back in force with CANAL + 🔥

▶ ️ https : //t.co/zI9DZImw6X pic.twitter.com/ktfQezZgsT

- Canal Football Club (@CanalFootClub) February 6, 2021

The Argentinian - who experienced the electric atmosphere of these posters when he was a player between 2001 and 2003 - knows that his team has nothing to gain in the war of little words.

PSG has every interest in placing the debates at the level of the field, diminished as it is by the absence of Navas and possibly of Neymar affected by gastroenteritis the day after his birthday (his package was not stopped on Saturday evening ).

Especially since Marseille has been swimming for eight days in an insurrectionary climate.

Between the attack on the training center by the supporters last Saturday, the dismissal of the resigning coach André Villas-Boas dissatisfied with the recruitment, the insistent demand of ultras for the resignation of President Jacques-Henri Eyraud, the rumors of buyout of the club by the Saudi prince and businessman Al-Walid Ben Talal, the will of the mayor Benoît Payan to sell the Vélodrome, we talked about everything… except football in recent days on the Canebière.

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In the midst of this tumult, the temperance of interim Nasser Larguet at the post of coach acts like a soothing cocktail.

"The motivation of the players will be natural," explained the director of the OM training center.

This is our Champions League in the Championship.

During the first period that we did in Lens (2-2), we saw a generous team, a team which advances, which is playful, complementary on a lot of actions. "

As if football - the one that sometimes has the right of the city in these posters - wanted to break through this maelstrom likely to lead OM, and this clasico, to the bottom.