A humid night in Monaco provided an opportunity to gauge the temperature of the Marseille supporters. Despite the ban on away fans at the Stade Louis II, plenty were in attendance for their 2-0 defeat in the Principality. There were cheers for their new manager, Bruno Génésio, and boos for Geoffrey Kondogbia, but it was the silence for much of the second half that spoke volumes.
Génésio, who replaced Habib Beye in the summer, has been appointed to keep a lid on things. The former Lille manager has been part of a larger reshuffle at Marseille, with the president and the sporting director also replaced. The new arrivals have inherited a mess.
After making promises to Uefa and the DNCG – French football’s financial watchdog – Marseille were allowed to compete in Europe this season. However, if they fail to reduce their wage bill drastically, they will not be allowed to do so next season. Every single player was put up for sale in the transfer window.
This was always going to be a difficult summer and their new sporting director, Grégory Lorenzi, has been open about that, but Génésio has been taken aback. Not exactly,” said the Marseille manager last week. I never imagined that we’d be in this position.” Marseille have sold Mason Greenwood, Facundo Medina, Gerónimo Rulli and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, with the former captain Leonardo Balerdi leaving on loan to Roma.
But those sales have not been sufficient for the club to dip into the market themselves; not one player has come through the door. Two games in, the threat is there, though. Despite his links to Lyon, Génésio has quickly endeared himself to the Marseille fans.
He is the vanilla manager that their fans have previously turned on. How could we forget the ill-fated stint of Marcelino, judged to have lacked that Marseillais fire and hounded out by fans after just seven games. When Génésio stepped on to the pitch for the warm-up on Sunday night, the Marseille fans behind the tunnel chanted his name.
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