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CLERMONT LA GAUTHIERE v 1st XI
9th September 2012
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Finding the stadium where this match was to be played was one thing. Finding the pitch was quite something else. Pitch n°1 I was told, which in its own perverse little way, was the one farthest from the dressing rooms over in the far corner.
So passing a couple of rugby matches and several other simultaneous matches I finally arrive at the pitch, having missed the first couple of minutes.
And much to my surprise, this match is being played on artificial turf, the first such match that I have ever encountered in the Puy-de-Dôme League. It rather reminds me of that television programme in the USA when they interviewed a famous gridiron player
"Which do you prefer? Grass or astroturf?"
"Hey man! I ain't ever smoked no astroturf!"
Running quickly through the team, up front is Cedric, Christophe and that new Julien who I've seen play for Marcillat in the past. Midfield is Nico, Julien and Vianney. Defence is Gaëtan, Sébastien, some new central defender called Michaël who has played here before apparently, and a new right-back called Frédéric who I've seen play for St Marcel when I've been on my travels. In goal is of course Matthieu.
Nothing much happens in the first 25 minutes except that we stop for a round of drinks. And that's hardly surprising. It was hot up in Chateaugay just now on the edge of a high plateau with a swirling wind. Down here in the big bowl that is Clermont-Ferrand it's stifling. I reckon it's a good 5° warmer here and even the spectators are roasting.
Mid-way through the second period of the first half, if that makes any sense, we finally have some action. Luckily I haven't gone to sleep like everyone else, so I'm poised with the camera.
It's a beautiful ball from Nico right out of, well, I suppose the left-back position diagonally across field and it heads straight to Cedric who looks as if he might pick it up, and that's what everyone on the Clermont team is thinking. Instead, Cedric steps over the ball and it goes right out to the right wing where this Julien is loitering.
He beats the left-back and plays the ball infield to where Christophe is standing unmarked but Christophe lifts up his head as he shoots and the ball clears the bar by a good 5 yards.
We have a substitution early in the second half. Julien leaves the field and he is replaced by Jonathan, another new player that the club has recruited this year.
Clermont score a goal midway through the second half, and how about this for a controversy? They break downfield and Bernard, running the line over there, raises his flag for offside. The Pionsat players pull up but play continues and the n°8 scores the goal.
You can see where the referee is. How he considers himself to be in a better position so as to overrule his linesman is one of those little mysteries to which I really do not know the answer. We have all kinds of arguments and everything going on after that, and I can't say that I'm surprised.
Thinking about it, we've had another controversial moment earlier in the game. A Pionsat player commits a foul on a Clermont player and the referee plays the advantage. When the advantage eventually comes to nothing, the referee brings the play back.
But the laws of the game say that the advantage has to have just two or three seconds to break down if play is to be brought back - not ten or fifteen seconds like just then.
Right from the kick-off, we have a moment of magic and I'm devastated that I was still having a nice refreshing mouthful of drink at the time. Christophe plays the ball forward at the kick-off and Cedric, looking up and seeing the keeper off his line, launches an outrageous lob from just in front of the halfway line.
It clears the keeper with ease and is sailing in right underneath the crossbar when a central defender just about gets his head to the ball and knocks it clear. That would have been Goal of the Century if that had gone in.
Yet more controversy now. A lovely diagonal ball finds this new Jonathan in the inside-right position and he catches the ball on his body and as it drops, he volleys it right into the back of the Clermont net. The (Clermont) linesman raises his flag - not for offside of course - for handball and the referee, miles behind play and even more unsighted that before, cancels the goal and awards a free kick to Clermont. How he could see that I really do not know, unless he has X-ray vision.
I was right level with play and all I can say that if that was Jonathan's hand - or arm - then I'm going back to school to re-learn all of my Anatomy. Things certainly have changed since the late 1960s, that's for sure.
And the referee, having made a few extremely controversial decisions which all have gone in favour of Clermont, has really swung the result of this match. Pionsat can feel really cheesed off by it.
So - what do things look like this season? Jérôme, who has gone to work in Auxerre, will be sorely missed. The two new forwards are okay at this level but Jérôme was special and he made a great difference to the side, as we shall find out as the season progresses. Cedric struggled today for the simple reason that he didn't have any service. The team needs to work harder at going down the flanks.
As for the defence, this new centre-half, Michaël, looked much more solid and the defence had the air of being much-more-organised that I've seen it in the past.
Mind you, Clermont looked a very ordinary side and didn't really offer much. The Pionsat of last season would have put three or four past them without too much effort. It's going to be a long, hard season I think.
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