Rarely has an Olympique de Marseille coach started his mission in such a hostile climate. For the first match of the Ligue 1 season, Sunday August 7 against Reims, Igor Tudor was playing big. Criticized since his arrival at OM in early July, criticized after disastrous preparation matches, greeted by supporters’ whistles at kick-off – a situation never seen before – the 43-year-old former Croatian international, on the list of coach still a virgin, held firm. And left the field to the cheers of a Velodrome stadium full of joy, a 4-1 victory under the arm.
In the week preceding the meeting, Igor Tudor received the clear support of its president Pablo Longoria. The latter recalled in front of the press, but also in front of the players, that he had personally chosen him for the very direct style of play he defends. The Croat grabbed the ball on the leap. And, from his team composition, confirmed that he was indeed the new sports boss of the Marseille club.
First victim: Dimitri Payet. On the match sheet, the captain and idol of the Olympian crowd is only a substitute. “Just a choice for the meeting”, relativized the coach at the microphone of the Amazon Prime broadcaster… “All players are important” he will also ensure during the press conference after victory.
Didn’t come to Marseille to listen to the vox populi
In reality, the sidelines of the one who was the guardian of the Marseille game with the previous coach, the Argentinian Jorge Sampaoli, was predictable. It is the consequence of a preparation where Dimitri Payet, 35, was not sufficiently attached to the defensive pressing required by his new coach.
But it is also a clear message to a group of which Dimitri Payet would have carried – what the player very diplomatically denied in front of the press – the recriminations towards the methods considered too brutal of his new coach.
Another sign that Igor Tudor did not come to Marseille to listen to the vox populi: Bamba Dieng, a young Senegalese striker appreciated by the public but whom he would not find invested enough, is not even in the group.
Two choices that can be read as a way of bringing a rebellious collective to heel. Or to take the risk of personally bearing the consequences of failure. With Tudor, we now know, it’s make or break.
Five out of eleven players were playing their first Ligue 1 match
Blue T-shirt, gray sweatpants, the Croatian giant did not make any effort in clothing for its premiere in a Velodrome stadium where 63,000 spectators, including a lot of tourists, crowded. Standing on the sideline, he harangued his players from the height of his 93 meter, gesticulating.
The fourth referee came to remind him that he had to stay inside the area reserved for coaches, two meters back. After half an hour of play, the central referee will remind him of the rule, without more success. The Marseille coach will receive his first yellow card in Ligue 1, twenty minutes before the end of the game.
The Tudor method is simple. Press high to recover the ball and play as quickly as possible towards the opposing surface. President Longoria explained that this verticality was, according to him, the future of football. At OM, whose motto is Straight to the point, this can be understood. But five chaotic preparation matches had cast doubt.
Facing Reims, the message seems to have finally materialized. From the first minute, the Turkish winger Cengiz Under, who had hung with Tudor a few weeks earlier, was the most zealous in applying the instructions. He slipped into the opposing defense and struck towards goalkeeper Patrick Pentz’s cage. The rest of the Marseille team was in tune. Was it because five out of eleven Olympians were playing their first Ligue 1 match at the Stade Vélodrome, and had as much to prove as their coach? Maybe.
The fans, however, appreciated it. From the 12e minute, Wouet Faes, the central defender from Reims catapulted a cross from ex-Lensois Jonathan Clauss into his own goal. Shortly after, Cengiz Under saw his shot deflected by the Reims goalkeeper on the crossbar, at the conclusion of a lightning movement from the overpowered Portuguese Nuno Tavares, on loan from the English club Arsenal. The two centerers are recruits that OM chose to stick to the Tudor system. They go fast and run long.
The Vélodrome roared with pleasure, forgetting the pre-match whistles
Other proof that the Croatian mayonnaise takes is Valentin Rongier, whom the coach promoted to captain in replacement of Payet, who concluded a collective push in the 25e minute. His shot crashes at the base of the Reims right post. Marseille has ideas in mind, even if they are, above all, those of their coach.
At the last minute of the first half, Nuno Tavares scores a second goal by pushing a solitary action to the end. Reims, with its clumsy shyness, helped OM a lot, but the results of this first half made in Tudor was damn positive. And the Vélodrome roared with pleasure, forgetting the pre-match whistles.
The result will be – almost – perfect for the Marseille coach. In the 60th minute, he replaced Polish center-forward Milik with Colombian Luis Suarez, who scored twice in the last half hour. Good prince, he also puts an end to the penance of Dimitri Payet, by sending him back to the lawn for a few tens of minutes.
The errors of its three-player central defense, another of its strategic certainties, went almost unnoticed in the general euphoria of the start of the championship which propelled OM on the heels of Paris-Saint-Germain. They risk being expensive against more experienced attacks, like the one that OM will have to face in the Champions League.
In the post-match conference, Igor Tudor will not fail to recall, in Italian, that the game developed by his players is the consequence ” of everything that has been worked well in training ». A response to those who questioned his methods. As for the whistles of the supporters before the meeting, he claims not to have heard them. “The fans are always right. Without them, there is no football,” he insists. Words that the Croatian coach does not intend to regret.
