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| Monday, July 29, 2002 21:50 EST |
French first division team-by-team guide
[Reuters]
PARIS -- Title prospects of French first
division teams for the 2002-2003 season starting on Saturday
(final 2001-2002 placings in parentheses):
OLYMPIQUE LYON (1)
Olympique Lyon is buoyant after winning its first league
title last season and it wants to become the first club to make
it a double in the French league since Olympique Marseille in
1992.
Coach Jacques Santini became France national coach and has
been replaced by Paul Le Guen.
With a budget increased by 23 percent to $99.31 million, Lyon has concentrated on keeping its senior
players including central defender Edmilson who won the World
Cup with Brazil, fellow Brazilian Sonny Anderson, top scorer in
last season's French league, and Gregory Coupet, France's third
goalkeeper at the World Cup.
LENS (2)
After losing the title to Lyon on the final day, Lens is
out for revenge but it will have to do without Senegalese
striker El-Hadji Diouf sold to Liverpool for $15.63 million.
Coach Joel Muller nevertheless stuck to his policy of buying
African players because "they are a lot cheaper than French or
European players". "We shall start the season with seven
Africans and I hope to sign another one," he said.
AJ AUXERRE (3)
After being in the race for the title, AJ Auxerre and its
charismatic coach Guy Roux had to be content with
qualification for the Champions League preliminary round.
Roux was as parsimonious as ever on the transfer market. He
managed to keep striker Djibril Cisse, who became the youngest
player in half a century to top the French league scoring table,
level with Portugal's Pedro Pauleta. At 20, Cisse was also the
youngest player in France's World Cup squad.
PARIS ST. GERMAIN (4)
PSG is without a league title since 1994 and the club failed to
qualify for the Champions League. The pressure is on coach Luis
Fernandez to deliver this season.
Brazil's Ronaldinho will be his star player. But PSG is in
financial turmoil as its owners, the pay-TV group Canal Plus,
have put the club up for sale.
LILLE (5)
Lille has changed everything, coach, chairman and senior
players.
Succeeding Bosnian-born Vahid Halilhodzic who, in four
years, guided the club from second division to a Champions
League first-round victory over Manchester United, will not be
an easy task for new coach Claude Puel.
The departure of four senior players, Bruno Cheyrou (to
Liverpool), Pascal Cygan (Arsenal), Johnny Ecker (Marseille) and
Dagui Bakari (Lens) will not help him.
GIRONDINS BORDEAUX (6)
Despite having Pedro Pauleta, who was voted French player of
the season and topped the league scoring table with Djibril
Cisse, Bordeaux was never in the title race last season but won
the League Cup.
The club's firepower will be increased by the arrival of
Jean-Claude Darcheville who scored 19 goals last season with
Lorient and was second only to Pauleta and Cisse.
TROYES (7)
Troyes has lost its emblematic coach Alain Perrin, who
steered the club back to the first division in 1999 and to
qualification for the UEFA Intertoto Cup last season.
Perrin left to succeed Bernard Tapie as Olympique Marseille
sports director. He was replaced by Jacky Bonnevay who had been
coaching second division Beauvais since 1999.
SOCHAUX (8)
Sochaux surprised itself last season when it finished
eighth in the league just after winning promotion but the clubs knows
the hardest part is to come.
"The second season in the top flight is often more difficult
than the first one," sports director Bernard Genghini says.
With a budget of 22.8 million euros, Sochaux could not spend
much but the team attracted the highly-respected En Avant Guingamp
coach Guy Lacombe.
OLYMPIQUE MARSEILLE (9)
For once Olympique Marseille was quiet on the transfer
front. Maybe because Bernard Tapie has left and was replaced by
the much quieter Alain Perrin, maybe because it is under
financial control and banned from recruiting unless the club sells
excess players.
"We have to reduce our wage bill by 35 percent," said the
club's chief Christophe Bouchet.
The cost-cutting exercise started with the departure of
Brazilian midfielder Andre Luiz Moreira and Spanish
international striker Alfonso who were on loan from Tenerife and
Barcelona.
NANTES (10)
Nantes, the 2001 champions, had a terrible season and had to
wait until the end of October for its first victory.
The first consequence was a fall in season tickets sales
from 23,500 last season to 19,000 at the same time this year and
a budget reduced by 30 percent from 90 to 65 million euros.
"We wanted to reduce our wage bill but we couldn't sell our
more expensive players so we decided not to buy," said chairman
Jean-Luc Gripond.
BASTIA (11)
Former Marseille and Bordeaux coach Gerard Gili came out of
semi-retirement to coach Bastia. He adopted the Corsican tourist
board's maxim: "Come and rejuvenate yourself under the Corsican
sun".
He took with him two players in search of a new lease of
life, striker Florian Maurice, signed from Marseille, and
midfielder Jocelyn Gourvennec, who wanted to leave Stade Rennes.
STADE RENNES (12)
At the end of last season, business mogul Francois Pinault
became tired of financing Stade Rennes with no results and
sacked the chairman, sports director and coach.
Philippe Bergeroo, who was coaching the goalkeepers when
France won the World Cup in 1998 and went on to manage Paris St.
Germain, is now in charge of the team.
His first statement was to say that "it is often difficult
to go straight from the cellar to the loft". His main signing
was the 20-year-old Czech goalkeeper Petr Cech from Sparta
Prague at a cost of five million euros.
MONTPELLIER (13)
Montpellier escaped relegation last season thanks to a bunch
of young players led by Aliou Cisse. The young players are still
there but Senegal's World Cup captain, who was on loan from
Paris St. Germain, rejoined PSG only to be sold to premier league
side Birmingham.
MONACO (14)
Didier Deschamps, the 1998 World Cup-winning captain, knows
that he will be in a win-or-be-sacked situation from the
beginning of the season after failing to lift a trophy or
qualify for Europe.
But Deschamps' first priority will be to reduce the squad
of 35 players, including too many expensive names such as German
striker Oliver Bierhoff, Argentine midfielder Marcelo Gallardo and
Italian defender Christian Panucci.
For the first time in many years, chairman Jean-Louis
Campora did not say he wanted his team to win everything. "Our
goal is to play well again," he said.
SEDAN (15)
As with several French clubs, the Wild Boars of the Ardennes
will rely on Senegal internationals. Henri Camara and Moussa
N'Diaye will stay on although Salif Diao is expected to join
Liverpool before the end of the season.
EN AVANT GUINGAMP (16)
Guingamp just escaped relegation last year and its coach
Guy Lacombe, tired of having to work on a shoestring budget,
left for Sochaux. He has been replaced by Bertrand Marchand who
was assistant coach with Stade Rennes.
"A club cannot play second fiddle for ever," he said. "I
know we have to be modest but I want us to reach excellence in
modesty as AJ Auxerre did under Guy Roux."
LE HAVRE (promoted)
Founded in 1872, Le Havre is the oldest club in French
football. Its soccer school is highly respected and the team has a special relationship with English premier league side
Liverpool.
Thanks to promotion, two of the players who won the under-18
World Cup with France, Anthony Le Tallec and Florent
Sinama-Pongole, will discover top-level club football before
moving on to Liverpool next year.
STRASBOURG (promoted)
After a year in the second division Strasbourg do not want
to yo-yo up and down. The club's fate could be sealed very quickly as
it will play its first three games against the three other
promoted teams, Ajaccio, Le Havre and Nice.
NICE (promoted)
After winning promotion, Nice was demoted to the third
division on financial grounds before its right to play in the
top flight was restored on July 19, barely two weeks before
its first championship game.
But new coach Gernot Rohr says: "The players went through a
very difficult time but now I feel they are ready to face
everything with an absolute serenity."
AJACCIO (promoted)
After 29 years in the wilderness, Ajaccio will have to
survive on the smallest budget of any first division side.
The club will also start the new season without a coach as
Rolland Courbis has been banned from soccer by magistrates
investigating a case of alleged fraud involving transfers when
he was coaching Olympique Marseille between 1997 and 1999.
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