Jeu du Jour Week 4: Fin de la ligne

Note the day in your diary: Sunday 30th August 2009 – the day Bordeaux's record breaking run of consecutive wins finally came to an end. Not that it saw a change in leader at the top of the Ligue 1 table – Les Girondins' 0-0 draw at Marseille means they remain the team to beat in France.

Bordeaux's run of fourteen back-to-back league wins that started in mid-March 2009 finally ended following a goalless draw at the Stade Velodrome. The current champions were somewhat lucky even to hold onto their long unbeaten run as the home side hit the woodwork twice through Brandao and Bruno Cheyrou. Indeed the home side were in the ascendency for much of the game, but they were lucky not have missed out on a point themselves when Bordeaux's Brazilian midfield Jussie saw his headed goal ruled out for an earlier discrepancy.

So the first match of the season involving the big three sees Bordeaux stay top and Marseille slip to fifth, and that slip has been caused by one of last season's three promoted sides from Ligue 2, Montpellier.

Runners-up to Lens in 2008/09, the South coast team have climbed to fourth place after maintaining their unbeaten start with a 3-0 win away to Nice. The game, however, was marred by crowd trouble when, in the second half, Nice fans threw fireworks onto the pitch and play was suspended for 20 minutes.

Montpellier had extended their lead to 2-0 four minutes after the interval through Victor Montano and it was here that the unrest among the home fans began. The referee ordered the players off until the situation had improved, and once it had, Nice picked up from where they left off with more great play, adding a third through Lilian Compan thirteen minutes from time. Shortly after, Nice saw their Nigerian defender Onyekachi Apam sent off for a second bookable offence to round off a dismal day for The Eagles.

Montpellier are joined by their fellow promotees, Boulogne and Lens in the top half of the table. Lens are up to sixth after a 2-2 draw at home to Rennes in which they fought from behind to lead 2-1, only to concede a 90th minute equaliser from Asamoah Gyan. In what proved to be an entertaining match, the away side started well with Gyan hitting the crossbar after Ismael Bangoura had given them the lead after just five minutes.

Having been on the back foot for some time, Lens equalised through a Yohan Demont penalty after 21 minutes but they were reduced to ten men when Marco Ramos was sent off early in the second half. It proved the spur for Lens to search for more goals and they took the lead eighteen minutes from time when Issam Jemaa headed in for a second, but Petter Hansson ensured Rennes deservedly got a share of the points with a well-struck shot in stoppage time.

Boulogne continue to surprise despite handing Auxerre their first point of the season in a goalless stalemate at the Stade de la Libération (the first time there's been a goalless match this Ligue 1 season). It was hardly the most entertaining game but the Ligue 1 newcomers did at least ensure that Auxerre were made to suffer their fourth game without scoring.

AJA are at least off the bottom of the table, an honour which has now been bestowed upon Grenoble, the only team without a point after four games. So bad was their form that even Saint-Etienne managed to beat them on Saturday. Few will be surprised to learn that both teams lacked much in the way of confidence, but Christophe Landrin grabbed the vital winner for Les Verts after 23 minutes to lift his side out of the bottom three.

Elsewhere, Lyon remain unbeaten and in third place thanks to a 3-1 win over the faltering Nancy. All three goals for Lyon came from their new signings Bafetimbi Gomis, Lisandro Lopez and Michel Bastos while the away side notched one up in the second half through Youssouf Hadji, brother of one-time Coventry City midfielder, Mustapha.

PSG are giving some heft to our pre-season prediction of future greatness by moving up to second spot with a 3-0 win at home to Lille. The visitors, whose only wins this season have come in both legs of their Champions League qualifier against Genk, put up a brave fight but two goals in the last twelve minutes from PSG finally sank any chances they had of grabbing a point.

Toulouse, like Lille, appear to be suffering from a similar dose of Euro fatigue after they surprisingly lost 1-0 to lowly Valenciennes. Having sent Trabzonspor packing with a 3-2 aggregate win in the Europa League last week, Toulouse had trouble breaking down the away team who, prior to this match, were without a point.

Three minutes from the end of normal time, it looked like both teams would get a point, but up popped Mamadou Samassa to smash home a dramatic winner which sends Valenciennes flying up to 15th spot in the table. Toulouse drop to 13th.

Finally this week, there were two mid-table match-ups featuring four of the most inconsistent teams in the league. Sochaux beat Monaco 1-0 thanks to a 20th minute penalty by Vaclav Sverkos, and Lorient beat Le Mans by the same scoreline – Tahitian striker Marama Vahirua getting the winner mid-way through the second half.

In the top goalscorers table, Yoann Gourcuff of Bordeaux still leads the way with four, one ahead of teammate Marouane Chamakh and two ahead of a wide range of different players from the whole of Ligue 1.

That's all for now. Until next week, it's à bientôt. Results and tables here.

Bundesbag Week 4: A little R 'n' R

There is a good reason why I'm a mere football blogger and Louis Van Gaal is a successful football manager and here's it is. When the news broke that Arjen Robben was signing for Bayern Munich I scoffed. "Pah!" I said "What do Bayern need another winger for. They need an attacking central midfielder, not competition for Franck Ribery."

Little did I know of course that Robben was to be played as an attacking midfielder. I was soon to find out and so were Wolsfburg. They were on the receiving end of the Dutchman's second half debut which resulted in him scoring two goals and linking up with Ribery like they'd played together for years. In 45 minutes Bayern had gone from a stuttering, uncertain team to Bundesliga contenders.

The problem is that a season doesn't last 45 minutes and the Munich club still have pressing issues at the back. Were it not for the intervention of Hans Jorge Butt in goal and Phillip Lahm on the goal line, Wolfsburg would have scored at least two goals and the outcome may have been different. On the plus side, the brilliant Anatoliy Tymoschuk not only nullified the Champion's attacking midfielder Zvjezdan Misimovic but was able to distribute the ball to the forward line superbly. Once they got past him mind, things got a bit tense and Bayern, in my opinion, remain vulnerable to wide balls and set pieces.

But what's this? The third Bundesbag in a row which has started with Bayern? What's this - the Bavarianbag? Why are we concerning ourselves with a mid-table outfit struggling to recover past glories when we should be looking to the top of the table and Hamburg?

There were no last minute transfer rabbits pulled from the hat up north. Bruno Labbadia had settled on his side in good order and he is reaping the dividends. The Red Shorts are brimming with attacking zeal in the likes of Paolo Guerrero, Mladen Petric, Piotr Trachowski and Ze Roberto. They may not be international household names but these guys know how to score goals. It was Guerrero who took centre stage on Sunday with a brace against Koln. Trochowski scored the third in the 3-1 win from the spot. The penalty was won under contentious circumstances with Koln keeper Mondragon claiming he never touched Ze Roberto, implying therefore that the Brazilian had dived. Unfortunately, there were no Scotsmen around to get a definitive opinion.

Koln didn't look as bad as the scoreline suggests. If they can find Lukas Podolski's 'on' switch and stop making stupid defensive mistakes they should be OK. You sense that they'll be fine after their first win.

Joint top of the table are Bayer Leverkusen who had to come back from a goal down after a mistake from Manuel Friedrich led to Diego Klomowicz giving their opponents Bochum a 1-0 lead. Friedrich made up for his error with an equaliser before Stefan Kießling restored order. 2-1 was the final score at the Bayarena.

In third are Werder Bremen and it's great to see them back at their knockabout best in a cracking 3-2 victory over Hertha Berlin at the Olympiastadion. Mesut Ozil was on target yet again. His third goal in 4 games. Could he be this season's Vedad Ibisevic?

Last season's Vedad Ibisevic was of course Vedad Ibisevic. He's struggling to find his scoring boots since his return from injury but that's OK because his team Hoffenheim are off and running with their first win of the campaign. Carlos Eduardo scored with an absolute scorcher at Hannover who have given interim coach Andreas Bergmann the gig full time.

Elsewhere, Stuttgart are struggling to get their groove on. They could only manage a 0-0 draw with Nurnberg. Eintracht Frankfurt may prove to be difficult to beat this season and they had a perfectly good goal ruled offside in their 1-1 draw with Borussia Dortmund. Also, I had a feeling that Mainz would not have returned to Earth after their magnificent win over Bayern in Week 3 and for once I was right. They lost 2-0 to Borussia Monchengladbach thanks to Raul Bobadilla's first goal since his arrival and a wonderful solo effort by Marco Rues. Remember the name.

Felix Magath's position at Schalke 04 was strengthened further last week as he took on the operating duties of the club president and effectively became part of the Board. He would have like to have celebrated his elevation with a comfortable home win against lowly Freiburg. Instead he suffered a 1-0 home defeat to the same. South Korean striker Du-Ri Cha was the pain provider. While it's still early in the season you can't help but wonder if Magath is simply being given a few extra yards of rope to hang himself with. We'll see.

In the 2 Bundesliga, FC St Pauli are the new leaders after an emphatic 4-0 (gerd) mullering away at Karlsruhe. Union Berlin are level on points with the Rieperbahn club after only managing a 1-1 draw at Augsburg.

That's it. Results and tables here. Follow the Bundesbag on Twitter.

Football Americana Week 24: leaders stumble

Week 24 threw up a few little surprises in Major League Soccer, including defeat for both Houston Dynamo and Columbus Crew, another win for New York Red Bulls and something vaguely resembling consistency from Real Salt Lake.

The week's action began in Salt Lake last Wednesday, where RSL thumped Chivas USA 4-0. Pablo Campos headed in Fabian Espindola's cross to put RSL ahead and give them a half time lead. Espindola turned scorer for the second, attacking the Chivas box and picking out the far corner brilliantly. In the last ten minutes, Robbie Findley twice turned Carey Talley inside out and twice found the back of the net to turn this one into a rout.

It finished goalless between Seattle Sounders and Toronto FC at Qwest Field on Saturday. Both teams had some remarkable chances to win it, Toronto in particular suffering from terrible finishing on a night which doubtless saw Dwayne DeRosario frustrated at the inability of his colleagues to be clinical with the opportunities he created for them. Sounders midfielder Freddie Ljungberg let his temper get the better of him and got a yellow card during an altercation in the second half - he was lucky he didn't turn it into red immediately.

Saturday's visitors to Gillette were San Jose Earthquakes and their hosts New England Revolution picked up yet another win in their hunt for a playoff spot which looked unlikely a few weeks ago. Steve Ralston raced onto a Shalrie Joseph flick-on and poked the ball past Joe Cannon for the opener, before Wells Thompson bent a stunning shot into the top corner for 2-0. Ramon Sanchez headed in a stoppage time consolation for the Quakes.

DC United went to Chicago Fire and snapped a long winless streak with a 1-0 victory. With 11 minutes gone, Christian Gomez bent in a free kick from deep and Bryan Namoff glanced it into the bottom corner. The Fire created some chances to equalise but nothing clear cut, and United held out pretty comfortably despite a late "discussion" between goalkeeper Josh Wicks and defender Marc Burch.

Real Salt Lake played their second match of the week at CommunityAmerica Ballpark where they needed just one goal to defeat the struggling Kansas City Wizards. Pablo Campos scored again, winning it for RSL with a superbly worked team goal in the 18th minute, though the Wizards defence was static throughout the move. The Wizards should have tied the game in the first half but suffered from woeful finishing. Just before the break, RSL's Ned Grabavoy was sent off for a very late studs-up challenge. With the exception of more bad Wizards finishing, the second half was nothing like as eventful.

Saturday was derby day in Carson, where LA Galaxy faced Chivas USA at HDC. One goal was enough for the Galaxy, but it took until the 80th minute to arrive. An attacking Galaxy throw-in went loose on the edge of the box and David Beckham found the net via the turf and the post to notch his first MLS goal of the season. Chivas striker Maykel Galindo had a terrible evening, putting in a display of poor finishing that would teach Ade Akinbiyi a thing or two and getting a red card late on. In the last few minutes Beckham and Landon Donovan almost combined to create a goal that would've been good enough to sweep away any residual unrest.

The weekend's big surprises came in Sunday's matches. First, Houston Dynamo fell to a deserved 1-0 defeat at the hands of Colorado Rapids at Dick's Sporting Goods Park. Julien Baudet headed a second half corner past Pat Onstad to secure three points for the Rapids. Brad Davis was sent off for Houston late on.

And in Jersey, New York Red Bulls surprised everybody by picking up a second consecutive win, this one against in-form Columbus Crew. Dane Richards scored the only goal of the game, crossing the yellow halfway line and the yellow 18-yard line at pace before finishing his blistering break with a shot over the yellow goal-line and into the net. Columbus Crew's five-game winning streak came to an end.

Week 24 is over and the playoff race is really heating up. Columbus and Chicago are the top two in the East, but New England and DC United lead the hunt to catch them. In the West, Houston and LA are being targeted by Seattle, Colorado, Real Salt Lake and Chivas. Currently occupying the four wild card slots are Seattle, Colorado, RSL and New England.

Full results and standings here.
For more great football writing by Chris Nee, visit TwoFootedTackle.com...

The Sound Of Football Podcast 4

Just a quick post to announce that the latest edition of the Sound Of Football Podcast is available to download.

This week we discuss Manchester United v Arsenal, Bayern v Wolfsburg and the Milan Derby.

You can now subscribe via iTunes or a reader of your choice. Or you can download or listen from the Sound Of Football website.

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