ASSE has once again sunk far from its bases. Timothée Maymon and Antoine Chirat returned to the rout of the Greens this Sunday evening in the Sainté Night Club. Anger and frustration. Excerpts.
A lack of intelligence to erase
Timothy Maymon: “The notion of home and away games, I can't understand it. If we had a team made up entirely of inexperienced young people, I would understand. That Mouton, for example, is less comfortable at outside than in the cauldron of Geoffroy-Guichard, still passes But finally, players like Appiah, Batubinsika, Abdelhamid, or Pétrot, they have already seen much worse in their career. So this excuse of “not being. guys outside”, as Larsonneur said, it's completely beyond me.
What I see, however, is a fragile team. A team where the slightest hitch, the slightest adverse event, the smallest grain of sand ruins everything. This micro-confidence that you painfully manage to build at home by scoring a victory here and there, it collapses as soon as something disrupts the machine. It could be a red card, a penalty, or simply a goal conceded. We have already seen this in the past. Let's take the example of Nice: after the first goal, nothing, no one, total silence, no more light.
And what is ASSE missing? Talent, that’s obvious. But for a promoted team, we cannot demand a squad full of brilliant players either. What is mostly lacking is character and, even worse, intelligence. Yesterday, Cafaro's gesture is clear proof of this. But this lack of intelligence is generalized: it affects all lines. A football match is not won with your feet alone. You also need to know how to think and manage strong times and weak times. Today, no one is capable of doing that on this team.
When Tardieu arrived, he brought a bit of this calm and lucidity. But now he no longer has the legs to play this role full time. It's not up to him to carry the team alone. Yesterday, Bouchouari and Mouton formed our central axis. Bouchouari has shown some good things lately, and Mouton is a youngster full of energy. But let's be honest: Bouchouari only has around ten matches in the Greens jersey, and Mouton is still very young. In comparison, look at Montpellier: Savanier and Chotard are a completely different pair. Frankly, I think our central axis is the most inexperienced in all of Ligue 1. These two players have potential, Bouchouari with his talent on the ball, and Mouton with his energy. But if they were already accomplished Ligue 1 players, that would be known.
This means that you have to be able to look for exactly this profile in the transfer window. We won't be able to bring in geniuses. We're not going to buy guys for 15 million just because Tannenbaum is the boss now. On the other hand, we have to look for cheaper guys, but with experience in Ligue 1 and the ball, because we lack the ball. ASSE lacks brains. I find that the only one who seems to me to be quite clever, who has some gumption, is Davitashvili. As for the rest, how weak it is!”
ASSE lacks character
Antoine Chirat (Onze Mondial): “And what is glaring for me is the lack of character and the lack of leader. We don't know where to turn at times like these. The players look at each other, they look for support and there is no one who is there to take the direction of the team, who is there to try to take everyone, to talk. It seems like no one speaks on this team. And even more so in difficult times. We look at each other, we have our heads in our socks, we lower our heads. We are dragging our feet, we have Larsonneur who is trying to raise his voice, but otherwise there is no one at the heart of the game who is there to refocus everyone, to speak and re-mobilize. In sequences like yesterday, when we take this red card, there must be someone who is capable of bringing everyone together.“
