Jean CANESSE, Media365, published on Friday January 24, 2025 at 10:53 p.m.
No winner in this duel of promoted between AJ Auxerre and AS Saint-Etienne (1-1). Despite the opening of the Burgundian score, the Greens hung a precious point in the maintenance race.
So that was not enough. Among other specific instructions (races, intensity, technique), Christophe Pélissier had made offensive efficiency the watchword at the time of this new duel of promoted between his Aja and AS Saint-Etienne on Friday. An efficiency rather present at Father-Deschamps, for Perrin and others, but which did not allow them to win a first match in Ligue 1 for two months all stack (four points taken on twenty-one).
Without Osho, excluded during the last defeat in Angers (2-0), but with the returns of Jubal and Joly, the eleven Icaunais had in any case made the difference first, taking advantage of its highlight. After shooting on the Sinayoko post (23rd), it was Traoré who launched his own after a superb individual rush (1-0, 27th). An eighth goal in Ligue 1, already, for those who had scored neither with Naples (9 matches) nor with Bournemouth (3 games) in Serie A and in the Premier League last season.
-Mensah's immense return
The Burgundians also failed on certain strikes, by Joly (15th), Massengo (76th) or Onaiwu (89th), and the same Joly could not materialize the only real Burgundian opportunity on the return from the locker room (52nd). But it is above all defensively, in fact, that they lacked efficiency. Harmless for almost 45 minutes, despite 67 % ball possession, the Greens were able to equalize before the break on their only situation of the first act. And after three interventions by Léon, it was Stassin who pushed the ball from the back of the net (1-1, 45th).
“A tone below technical level”, by the admission of Appiah after the meeting, ASSE could even win without a huge return from Mensah on its line. Boakye had just erased Léon, hitting a goal that was thought out, but that was without counting the feat of the Auxerrois defender (58th). Unable to be more dangerous and therefore to decide, the two teams seemed rather satisfied from this point taken for the maintenance. In the ranking, ASSE (14th) leaves the red zone and currently has a point ahead of Nantes and Rennes, before their weekend match. AJA (still 11th) retains its five points ahead of the Greens.
