After the defeat against Paris Saint-Germain (3-1) last Sunday, Pierre Sage finds himself singled out. The Olympique Lyonnais coach made a mistake in his choices, perhaps made for the wrong reasons.
The Pierre Sage hype is still present, but some criticism is starting to fall towards the 45-year-old coach. Long praised for his results, his philosophy and his communication, the Olympique Lyonnais coach lowered his rating after the defeat against Paris Saint-Germain last Sunday. The technician had decided to strengthen his midfield by abandoning his 4-2-3-1 for a 4-3-3 which did not have the desired effect. On the contrary, journalist Elton Mokolo believes that this pattern precipitated the fall of Les Gones at the Parc des Princes.
« It’s not because you add a third midfielder that you will have more security and possessioncommented the Eurosport columnist. Lyon played rather unnaturally. They tried to pressure PSG. But particularly in holding the ball, they were very deficit. You only have to look at the activity of Matic, Veretout and Tolisso who fell short of their performances and that had an impact on Lyon’s performance. » Especially since Pierre Sage did not wish to return to his preferential pattern in the second period.
« At one point, I told myself that he was going to break up this three-way middle to have a more risky approach. This was not the case, there was this triple change (Benrahma, Lacazette and Fofana replaced Cherki, Mikautadze and Nuamah in the 66th) which did not help OLrecalled the observer. In the nature of the changes, I think Luis Enrique won his game against Pierre Sage. It’s a shame for OL because we had the feeling, after Mikautadze’s goal, that OL, even if PSG were on top, could reverse the trend in the last 30 minutes as they did often done. It didn’t happen, PSG even scored a third goal. »
“Administrative changes”
« I have the feeling that we had administrative and scheduled changes that did not go in the direction of the match. And that poses a problem to me. In a difficult start to the match, Cherki had the merit of improving the balls, culminating in this great assist for Mikautadze. I think it was a match for Cherki, we had to leave him for 90 minutes. Were there physical considerations in relation to the riot of energy against Frankfurt? I think there is some truth in that. But the changes didn’t help OL, it’s quite the opposite, I think they weakened OL », noted Elton Mokolo, disappointed with Pierre Sage’s choices.
