OM kept at home by Strasbourg

Olympique de Marseille, who hoped to consolidate their second place in Ligue 1, suffered at their expense on Sunday January 19 at the Stade-Vélodrome against Starsbourg. The Alsatians held the Marseillais in check (1-1).

With the defeats of Monaco, Nice and Lens and the draw in Lyon, OM had, in fact, the opportunity to perform very well and push their rivals even further for European qualification. But after its elimination on Tuesday by Lille in the Coupe de France, after penalties, it failed to win against Strasbourg.

After having very clearly dominated and won their first clash in September at Meinau (1-0), Liam Rosenior's Strasbourg decided to continue to complicate life for the Marseillais. They achieved it, after a strange match, closed before the break then totally unbridled in the second period.

Very quickly, the two teams launched into a tactical duel, while OM was handicapped by numerous absences (Rongier, Kondogbia, Murillo, etc.). All in all, the match got off to a fairly tight start, where Leonardo Balerdi's huge risk-taking on the restart, blocked by Emanuel Emegha, was initially the biggest opportunity.

But the Dutch Racing striker, currently in great shape, then took advantage of a deep pass from Andrey Santos, right in the heart of Marseille's very naive three-way hinge, to open the scoring and put OM in a big way. difficulty (1-0, 23^e).

Slow, so diligent that it often seemed very academic, De Zerbi's team, for its part, was never really dangerous before the break.

Marseille tried everything

Returning from the locker room, she recovered, notably thanks to the entry of the very young Robinio Vaz, not yet 18 years old, but that was not enough. After two clear chances from Mason Greenwood (47^e) and especially Luis Henrique, who hit the post in the 64th^eit is thus the usual center forward of the OM reserve team, which plays in N3, who won a penalty in the duel with Andrey Santos.

Greenwood transformed it (1-1, 68^e) and the match, already more open, suddenly became intense. Emegha, formidable, in turn hit the post against (72^e), then Robinio Vaz placed a difficult volley above the Alsatian goal (79^e).

In the last quarter of an hour, Marseille tried everything to win, in vain. OM's series nevertheless remains favorable, with five wins and two draws since the last defeat conceded against Auxerre. And his mattress in Lille (3^e) and Monaco (4^e) remains thick, with five and six points respectively.

Strasbourg, for its part, is 10^ebut what the Alsatians showed at the Vélodrome suggests that they have the right to look upwards.