This weekend was great for Arsenal fans, Jeremy Mathieu, Jeremy Mathieu's mom, fans of Cristiano Ronaldo's punchable face and people who hate Liverpool. For everyone else, though, it was a drag. It was all blowouts or low-scoring affairs. The last hope for the weekend's redemption rested in the hands of Marseille and Paris-Saint Germain in Le Classique. The French rivals proved to be more than up to the task.
As in every great rivalry, there is no love lost between these teams, who competed their asses off for 90 minutes. You know who else competed their asses off? Marseille's fans. I finished the game with a profound respect for all 50,000-plus who were packed into the Stade Velodrome yesterday. This statement should not be downplayed. This is the first time I can remember respecting the French for anything.
Andre-Pierre Gignac opened the scoring in the 30th minute with a cracking header for Marseille, nearly jumping over Marquinhos in the process (full highlights at the bottom of the article). Then, David Luiz pulled up lame with a hamstring injury and Gregory Van Der Wiel came on at right back, moving Marquinhos to the center.
So PSG looked to be in trouble until Blaise Matuidi sent a curler to the far post that Steve Mandanda got a fingertip on, but that was not enough to keep it out .
But, just before halftime, Gignac struck again, capitalizing on a Javier Pastore turnover.
During the second half, things got interesting, starting with a Zlatan Ibrahimovic free kick in the 49th minute. Playing on Easter Sunday held special significance for Zlatan, who once told Marco Verratti that he was Jesus.
The divines were smiling on Zlatan this day, because he slipped, and sent a wobbly bouncing ball into the box, where it wobbled and bounced its way onto the foot of Marquinhos, who deposited it in the back of the net.
Four minutes later, the fates struck again, as poor Jeremy Morel, marking Zlatan, put a cross intended for the big Swede (the announcers kept calling him that, like "Zlatan" wasn't an original enough name for them) into his own goal.
PSG held on from there (with 10 men because of an injury to Thiago Motta in the 90th minute), with the match coming to a legitimately thrilling conclusion, with Zlatan trying desperately to get an Easter Sunday goal and Steve Mandanda, who once did this, standing on his head to deny him. Ultimately Marseilles were too exhausted from pressing the whole game to manage an equalizer, but I can't fault them for that because it was the pressing that made the game so darned interesting in the first place.
Other match highlights:
Edinson Cavani causing me to have to look up the word "strop" in the dictionary.
Javier Pastore with some world-class time wasting, refusing to take a corner because the Marseilles fans were throwing paper at him. You can't teach that. That's just a gift.
Andre Ayew getting sent off for dissent after the MATCH WAS ALREADY OVER.
Some interesting tactics from Marcelo Bielsa, who chose to sub Gignac off in the 71st minute when he ALREADY HAD TWO GOALS.
The realization that PSG might be without Zlatan, David Luiz and Thiago Motta against Barcelona in the first leg of the Champion's League Quarterfinal. Not good.
This was my first Classique, but it definitely won't be my last. If this turns out to be the norm, this might be the best rivalry in football.
