After their elimination on penalties against Panathinaikos this Tuesday evening at the Vélodrome, after a return match of the third preliminary round of the Champions League, OM blames the blow like Mattéo Guendouzi of its president Pablo Longoria, who has a real feeling of incomprehension mixed with disappointment. For his part, Marcelino tried to remain positive towards his players.
Even before the end of the penalty shootout, Mattéo Guendouzi accused the blow, both hands on his head, near the central circle, awaiting the sentence, but already aware of living personally one of the worst evenings of his career. A penalty caused by an involuntary hand, which miraculously put the Greeks back in the game; a charge not whistled into the opposing area during extra time, which could have been worth a penalty to OM; the false joy of a Vitinha goal disallowed by the video, while the former Gunner was decisive passer; and finally the only missed shot on goal of a cursed and fateful session.
“We are with him, we support him,” Marcelino said after the game. Guendouzi had participated, totally stunned like many of his teammates, in the lap of honor after elimination, in an almost empty stadium, interspersed with whistles from some supporters, encouragement from others. “Until the locker room, Matteo was inconsolable”, slips a witness. All the players were moreover in shock, convinced of having been much better than their opponent in the second leg, of paying too dull a performance in the first leg, and of having also suffered facts from the opposite game, or arbitration decisions more than questionable.
Pablo Longoria, who quickly descended into the locker room after the end of the match, could not hide his dismay. With his face marked by disappointment, the president of OM experienced this elimination as a bad fate of fate: a lot of bad luck in the return match, a first meeting in Athens where OM were not at the level, he recognizes it, all against the backdrop of controversial decisions on which the Olympian boss will choose not to speak publicly. Longoria, the whole management and the club as a whole think no less. There is, within OM, a real feeling of incomprehension in relation to the arbitration on this double confrontation against Panathinaikos.
The positive speech of Marcelino
The players did not imagine staying at the dock, even less from the 3rd preliminary round, and not competing in the Champions League. Recruits had signed with OM to get to know the C1, in Marseille and at the Vélodrome. Those who were already there last season nurtured a feeling of revenge for the third place obtained with Igor Tudor, at the end of a rather exciting season in the league, where OM faltered at the very end of the exercise.
Marcelino, for his part, tried to keep a positive message with his players, telling them in particular that the performance of this return match was very promising. The Spaniard, lucid and sincere about the fact that his team was not 100% in August, feared this start to the season. OM, who suffered physically in the first leg and at the end of the second leg, should they have resumed their pre-season preparation earlier? The argument is swept away internally, where it is recalled that between the internationals and the recruits who arrived gradually, only a handful of players (Lopez, Clauss, Rongier, Gigot, Guendouzi, not counting the convalescents Ounahi and Harit) would have been available if the recovery date (July 3) had been brought forward.