In a tense atmosphere, the Marseille club lost at home its second match in the competition against Frankfurt (0-1) with a Dimitri Payet Transparent.
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The Champions League had never seen the new full-velodrome stadium due to work-between 2011 and 2014-and closed doors due to COVVI-19, in 2020-2021… The Marseille public has long been waiting for this gala. Tuesday, September 13, 63,000 spectators – Gauge fixed by the club which stopped ticket sales – lived the defeat (0-1) of OM against Eintracht Frankfurt, last winner of the Europa League.
Despite its partly renewed workforce, his coach – Igor Tudor – Competition finalist in 2003 (with Juventus Turin) and his excellent departure in Ligue 1, the Marseille club remains stuck in the curse that touches him in the ‘ Queen of European football. Beaten in London by Tottenham (0-2) A week earlier, Marseille continues against Frankfurt his sixteenth defeat in seventeen meetings in the Champions League. And mortgage already its chances of accessing the knockout stages in the spring.
The game took place in a tense atmosphere. After a few clashes between supporters the night before the match, the day had been rather calm in town. The massive police system – nearly 600 police forces deployed in the center and around the stadium – avoided the dreaded overflows. Grouped in a specific area, Place de la Joliette, a few kilometers from the Vélodrome, the 3,300 German supporters were conveyed in around thirty buses to the stadium. Without a major incident.
It was only once in their gallery that things were spoiled. The Bouches-du-Rhône police prefect reported a series of Nazi greetings to the European Football Union (UEFA). And the CRS used tear gas before settling in a buffer between Germans and Marseillais. An hour before kick -off, the two Phocaean turns were already full so as not to leave the strong colony of Frankfurt winning the challenge of noise.
Payet, the shadow of its past splendor
The confrontation was not only vocal. As the players were heating up, the North turn and the opposing grandstand exchanged pyrotechnic vehicles. A fireworks fire as dangerous as it is unacceptable in a sports enclosure, which left in the middle of the second half and then at the end of the match. A German supporter was hospitalized after being touched by a smoke and three members of the police were injured.
We know now, Igor Tudor is a man of convictions. And until Tuesday evening, it had achieved him rather. Despite the absence of Chancel Mbemba and Samuel Gigot, two of his central defenders most used since the start of the season, the Croatian coach of OM has changed anything in three behind. As promised the day before, Tudor relaunched the Argentinian Leonardo Balerdi, however catastrophic against Lille three days earlier.
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