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Marseille, very serious and above all infinitely superior to its opponent, corrected Le Havre (5-1) on Sunday at the Stade Vélodrome and thus preserved in 2025 its dynamic of 2024, while achieving a great operation in the ranking in the French Championship.
We had forgotten it a little, but before losing on Sunday in Qatar against Paris Saint-Germain during the Champions Trophy, Monaco had already lost to the same opponent before Christmas, in a (very) advanced match of this 16th day .
And as Lille was unable to do better than a draw against Nantes, it is OM, in addition to PSG, who are the big beneficiaries of the weekend among the Champions League contenders.
A good distance from the capital club (7 points), Marseille is in fact a solid runner-up, with three lengths ahead of Monaco and five ahead of Lille and Lyon.
Before a series of probably more complicated matches – against Rennes, Strasbourg and Nice in Ligue 1 and against Lille in the Coupe de France – the Marseillais also confirmed that they now had real certainties in the game, validated by the results with a current series of five victories and a draw between championship and Cup.
Fragile wall
Sunday, they left the first strike of the match to Le Havre, with Ilyes Housni, who did not hit target (7th). But then there was nothing more for the Normans. As expected, OM confiscated the ball and worked to circulate it in front of the double wall installed by Didier Digard in front of Arthur Desmas’ goal.
The Le Havre coach’s plan was undoubtedly to see the building stand until the end but the whole thing was not very solid and after a series of more or less dangerous attempts — Amir Murillo in the 10th, Adrien Rabiot in the 14th and 16th, Valentin Rongier in 18th or Mason Greenwood in 23rd –, everything gave way.
The first to find the opening was Rongier, already a scorer at Lens, who deceived Desmas with a nice shot from the right at the entrance to the area (1-0, 25th). If the former Nantes player, renowned for only marking good years once a year, starts to aim correctly, all hopes are allowed for OM.
On Sunday, he in any case unlocked the match and forced Le Havre to venture a little higher, while seeing more than one in the Marseille camp had been a real rarity during the first half hour.
Ayew acclaimed
With these few extra spaces, Roberto De Zerbi’s players were able to push their attacks a little further and scored two more times before the break.
In the 39th minute, the young Bilal Nadir (21 years old) widened the gap with a nice cross shot from the left into the area (2-0, 39th). Then Neal Maupay, always a clever goal hunter, found the target with his head (43rd) and celebrated like a dart thrower.
At 3-0 at the break, the matter was settled but Marseille continued to play their well-regulated football. Maupay was thus twice more close to the goal before giving way to Elye Wahi.
And as the Marseille evening was almost perfect, the former Montpellier also scored, on a gift pass from Greenwood, and thus gave himself a nice ovation from the Vélodrome, which surely did him good after a difficult half-season (4-0, 66th).
Ten minutes later, Ulisses Garcia increased the score on his first ball (5-0, 75th) and the Vélodrome public was not even upset about the reduction in Le Havre’s score, because it came from Andre Ayew, a child of the club (5-1, 85th). The Ghanaian was also given a standing ovation and Marseille had a great evening to start the year.
