Tthat pot finally boiled. Stade Geoffroy-Guichard is kindly nicknamed Kazan due to its fiery atmosphere, but the nickname took on a sour taste as it was greeted by fiery fans chasing players in the tunnel as St-Étienne’s relegation to League 2 on Sunday night.
After a campaign of cataclysms on and off the field, St-Étienne was able to survive temporarily on the last day of the league season thanks to a late draw by Romain Hamouman to Nantes. The goal led them to a two-legged draw with Auxerre, who finished third in Ligue 2, leading them to the top and lower league playoffs from Metz.
St-Etienne, who dominated the away game last Thursday but only drew 1-1, could not cope with the task in front of their fans. As both games ended with a score of 1: 1, the draw will be determined by penalties. Ryad Boudebouz’s first shot was saved and Auxerre scored all five penalties to advance.
Birama Toure’s penalty kick was barely crossed when St-Étienne fans gathered in thousands of tunnels and fled to the pitch after the players were quickly evacuated. Auxerre had just one second left to celebrate their return to Ligue 1 a decade later, without witnessing the turmoil around them as the happy players flocked to Toure.
Torches were lit against the players, seats were set on fire and riot police intervened with tear gas. Amazon Prime’s broadcast had to be cut off because commentators were struggling with thick smoke. In a season when French football was embarrassing from the very beginning, St-Étienne fans left their worst to the end, as their anger filtered from the stands and turned into something more ugly than just a protest.
One of the stands was already closed as a result of torches thrown on the field in the game they lost to Monaco 4: 1 last month. Ki Stephanois they are expected to express their frustration, but the outburst of anger is equally blaming them, and this season is a sign of a wider, never-ending problem with stadium incidents that the French government has failed to address properly. Local police said 33 people were injured overnight, including two Auxerre players in chaos.
On paper, the team with Boudebouz, Wahbi Khazri and Denis Bouanga should not fall down. However, on-field and off-field turmoil and the lack of a consistent transfer window meant that no individual brightness could confuse St-Etienne.
After taking office from Claude Puel in December, the ardent Pascal Dupraz, who enjoyed the new manager’s leap, was unable to mobilize troops to survive the winter months. Despite the relative richness of his technical talent, Dupraz was unable to come up with anything resembling a winning game plan, instead serving ambitious, tasteless, tasteless football. This was hardly balanced by the strength of any defense; They conceded 77 goals in 38 league games.
It was a disgusting season for St-Étienne’s defense. Harold Moukoudi has not won any of his 26 Ligue 1 games this season. Captain Timothée Kolodziejczak was sent off after disastrous performances, including own goals against Marseille and Monaco. Former Sevilla and Rennes player Joris Gnagnon arrived as a free agent in November and failed to shed the pounds needed to reach the fitness of the match, eventually leaving without appearing even once in May. The culmination of their defensive difficulties came in April with a 6-2 defeat to lower-league rivals Lorient, who all sealed their place in the top three.
Human management, which characterized Dupraz’s previous spectacular runs with Toulouse and Evian, is no longer a recipe for success on its own. Not surprisingly, his six-month contract will not be renewed. He ends his time with 20 points from Les Vertz, which is undoubtedly Puel’s 12-point lead over the team during the winter break.
The fall of St. Étienne is the story of the boiled frogs. Both presidents, Roland Romeyer and Bernard Caïazzo, have monitored the club’s withdrawal as successive offers have been pushed by one or the other, putting the club’s much-needed sale on hold for years. When both men preferred their preferred contenders and neither wanted to invest much in the club, they became financially and sports-minded. In November, the Cambodian prince publicly announced his intention to buy the club, as a lawsuit over the club’s fake 100 million-euro bank guarantee letter quickly put an end to the prospect of the king’s capture.
Following Sunday’s final whistle, the club issued a statement announcing that “important news about the club’s future” would be on the way, signaling that the club could be sold to American investor David Blitzer, who is already part of it. Owner of Crystal Palace, Augsburg, Alcorcon and Real Salt Lake. Blitzer and his billionaire colleague Josh Harris have made two different proposals: one if the club stays in Ligue 1 and the other if it relegates to Ligue 2.
St-Étienne may be better able to return to Ligue 1 by maintaining its unique character than turning into another gear of the multi-club ownership system. However, Canadian businessman John Chaika’s offer to buy the club, which precludes him from pursuing a multi-club strategy to protect St Étienne’s identity, appears to have been ignored due to Caïazzo’s personal relationship with the Blitzer.
This leaves the club with a lot of questions, but there is not much time to answer them. When the contracts of the 13 key team players expire, the manager is preparing to leave and there is no sign of how the ownership situation will develop, it will be the new-looking St-Étienne, who will start his life in the second tier in August.
The club could start their second-tier life with negative points and will probably spend most of their home games behind closed doors. Former Troyes manager Laurent Batlles is said to be a favorite to return to the club where he finished his footballing career in 2012, although disagreements with Caïazzo and Romeyer as he manages stocks in 2019 could disrupt the move.
St-Etienne has been on a free fall for the past three years, unable to regain the spark of Christophe Galtier’s years or the resilience they gained during Jean-Louis Gasset’s reign. Until 2017, the club consistently qualified for Europe and developed the most interesting talents of the continent. Now they are returning to Ligue 2 for the first time in 16 years.
Ligue 1 will be without Etienne and Bordeaux next season for the first time before World War II. The collapse of two of France’s most prestigious clubs, which boast 16 league titles, is full of incompetence and self-interest, but most importantly, it evokes a sense of simplicity.
When only two teams were promoted from Ligue 2 the following season – to help rebuild the high-level flight to a total of 18 teams – St Étienne and Bordeaux were able to close the gates of Ligue 1 to them for a while. From Covid-19 to a failed broadcasting contract with Mediapro, the problems are deeper in both clubs, although they have proven themselves to be victims of French football’s financial disputes.
The pot finally boiled, the frog came out, and now it begins to clean. The connection between fans, players and owners is almost irreparably broken, but they will need some kind of unity to survive in the most highly rated Ligue 2 campaign for a while. Until then, management will have to avoid mixing the pot and hand the club over to the safest hands in the summer.