Just in time for the derby…
By: Benj |
11 Comments
The Saint Etienne blog is back! My name is Ben and I will be writing for the Saint Etienne Offside as of today. With the derby coming up, we have a lot on our plate, so let’s jump right in.
Category: St Etienne Team News
Where were we?
By: Jonathan | 5 Comments
Time to get this blog going again. That was a bit of a long break – sorry about that, my wife gave birth to our first child towards the end of 2008 and I have been quite busy since then! It’s a boy, so I intend to bring him up as a Francophile and a St Etienne fan. I can try, anyway.
St Etienne have been busy too – being awful. With a meagre total of 20 points so far, they are only one place (and three points) off the relegation zone. They’ve also just been knocked out of the Coupe de France. They are still in the UEFA Cup, but very unlikely to win it, so the priority until May has to be “le maintien”. Can they do it, or is this once-great club heading for yet another spell in Ligue 2? Find out here in the coming months on The Offside’s St Etienne page.
Category: St Etienne Team NewsSt Etienne 1 PSG 0
By: Jonathan | 2 Comments
That’s more like it. Out of the relegation zone, and a superb goal to boot:
Thank you, Mouhamadou Dabo. I doubt we’ll see a better goal all season. Hopefully, following the UEFA Cup win against Tel Aviv last Thursday, this will enable Les Verts to get their season back on track. They are still only 16th though, and Pascal Feindouno is being annoying again, running off to Qatar without permission. However things turn out this time, it’s only a matter of time now before he leaves.
Another problem: Mirallas is out for three weeks. He still hasn’t played a single game for his new club.
Next game is away to Guingamp in the league cup tomorrow, before a tough test in Bordeaux next Sunday.
Category: St Etienne Team NewsCaen 2 St Etienne 0
By: Jonathan | Add Comments
Well that’s it I think, the start of the new season is now officially a disaster for St Etienne. Five games, four defeats and only two goals scored has left les Verts in the relegation zone, pretty much the exact opposite of where pre-season expectations had placed them. (Not quite as bad as Spurs in England, who have spent big, talked big and been rewarded with last place in the league, but that’s another story, which I will leave to my English colleagues on The Offside.) Manager Laurent Roussey says he is “trying to be calm”, but that must be pretty difficult when you have just lost your third match in a row and, adding to insult to injury, your team has had not one but TWO goals disallowed. That followed the ludicrous penalty awarded against St Etienne in the first game of the season at Valenciennes.
I haven’t seen the incidents in question – two Gomis goals ruled out for offside, apparently – but I have seen Caen’s goals, and all you can say is that once again, St Etienne’s defending was very poor. On both occasions, Viviani pulled off a save (you could argue that he might have done better) and each time, the Caen forwards reacted quickly to knock in the rebound while les Verts just stood around ball-watching. You can watch the goals here. Roussey defended his players, saying they had done well and had simply been the victims of more bad refereeing, but these guys need to sharpen up, and fast. They have their first UEFA Cup game on Thursday and they won’t be making much progress with defending like this. Progress in the UEFA Cup looks like their best chance of securing European football next season, as they already look unlikely to qualify through the league. Is it too early to say they have a relegation battle on their hands?
UPDATE: The ref has admitted that the second Gomis goal should have stood and maybe the first one too. Credit to him for that, but it’s not much consolation for the Stephanois!
Category: St Etienne Team NewsSt Etienne 0 Lyon 1
By: Jonathan | 2 Comments
Not sure if this is one of St Etienne’s worst ever starts to a season, but it is now officially really bad. Three defeats in the first four games. Sheesh. And the team has failed to score in each of those defeats. Not looking good so far.
Yet more poor defending on Saturday. They simply allowed a striker far too much space, just as they did against Le Mans. Excellent goal from Benzema though:
And afer all Piquionne’s posturing, he only played for the last 17 minutes, making little impact. So that little episode can be forgotten about.
Never mind the UEFA Cup – St Etienne have to sort out their league form, and fast.
Category: St Etienne Team NewsUEFA Cup draw
By: Jonathan | 2 Comments
Right then, it’s Hapoel Tel Aviv. Not a name to set the pulses racing, but a decent team with plenty of experience in Europe. St Etienne will need to be on good form to progress – but they will be glad to have avoided teams like Hamburg and Feyenoord. Olympiakos would have been tough as well. The first leg will be in Israel on September 18 with the return leg at Geoffroy Guichard on 2 October. “If we play well in Tel Aviv, then we can count on our 12th man to help us qualify in the retun leg,” said Roland Romeyer, the club’s joint president. If only results could be decided by how good the supporters are, St Etienne would be champions every year. Allez les Verts!
Category: St Etienne Team NewsPre-Lyon round-up
By: Jonathan | Add Comments
It’s a big week for St Etienne. The draw for the UEFA Cup takes place at 13h on Friday. This will provide Les Verts with their first opponents from outside France in 26 years (unless you count the Intertoto Cup in 2005).
Then, on Sunday, le derby against Lyon. St Etienne, who have held their training sessions in secret this week, have not beaten their hated neighbours since 5 April 1994. Could this be the weekend they finally notch a win? On current form, it seems unlikely. They have lost both of their away matches this season, amassing a grand total of no goals in the process. Few will expect the end of that run against the team that has won seven championships in a row. But they nearly managed it last season – they led 1-0 until the 92nd minute, when Lyon sneaked an equaliser. “We just need to do the same thing we did last year, but without conceding a goal this time,” says midfielder Christophe Landrin.
Latest transfer rumour – Arsenal want Matuidi. Can’t see that happening myself unless the Gunners agree to sign a huge cheque, which is not something they are really known for.
One player who is definitely going – Daniel Bilos. His contract, which had a year left to run, has been cancelled by mutual consent. He’d been struggling with injury since November 2007.
Category: St Etienne Team NewsA good crowd
By: Jonathan | 1 Comment
Some clubs would be glad to get this many supporters at a normal game, let alone at a training session. So come on, les Verts, how about a decent performance against Lyon to give the fans something to shout about?
Category: St Etienne Team NewsLe Mans 1 St Etienne 0
By: Jonathan | Add Comments
Dear oh dear. Another away game, another defeat. This was not the best way to prepare for next weekend’s crucial derby clash with Lyon. Was last season’s fifth place a false dawn?
The match report on the club site makes it sound as if St Etienne had plenty of possession, but were caught out by a quick counter-attack in the first half and just could not score despite laying siege to the Le Mans goal.
Here’s the winning goal – looks like really poor defending to me. There’s no way Helstad should have been allowed that much space inside the box:
Manager Laurent Roussey described the defeat as “worrying”, saying that the match was basically the same as the game against Valenciennes, except that this time the winning goal was not a controversial one. “We didn’t have the resources or the talent to get back on level terms,” he said. “I just don’t recognise my team. I can’t understand the lack of commitment from older players and even the younger guys who played with hunger last year look different to me as well.”
Category: St Etienne Team NewsPiquionne’s fit of pique
By: Jonathan | 2 Comments
You may have heard of Frédéric Piquionne. He played for St Etienne for two and a half seasons, scoring 23 goals before being loaned to Monaco. He now plays for Olympique Lyonnais and has decided to stir things up ahead of the derby with les Verts by claiming that even while he was at St Etienne, he “already felt at home at Lyon”. He would go to matches in Lyon, did his shopping in the city and took advantage of its nightlife. He is now looking forward to “shutting a few people up” when he returns to Geoffroy-Guichard with his new club at the end of August. There is no love lost between him and the people who run ASSE: “They didn’t want to let me leave and now that I have left, they spit on me. I will not be shaking their hands.” A full account of his comments is here.
St Etienne’s grands fromages have responded, publishing a statement on the club website accusing Piquionne of “defamation”. They also criticise him for claiming that St Etienne fans would throw things at him, noting that the club’s supporters have just been voted the best in the league for the second season in a row.
Best supporters in the league or not, Piquionne has certainly guaranteed himself a hostile reception in “the Cauldron” on the 31st. St Etienne have another game before that, of course, this Saturday, when they play at Le Mans, but supporters are already thinking about the derby with Lyon. There was a big queue for tickets when they went on sale at the stadium earlier this week.
In other news, Belgian striker Kevin Mirallas says that the deal to take him from Lille to St Etienne should soon be done. In his head, he is “already at St Etienne”. Christophe Landrin, who missed the game against Sochaux through injury, says it’s nothing serious and that he could be involved against Le Mans. Loïc Perrin, another absentee on Saturday, is also back in the reckoning.
According to France Football, St Etienne’s Brazilian striker Ilan could soon be returning home. Flamengo is his most likely destination, as long as the two clubs can agree on a price.
Category: St Etienne Team News
Home 
