Just like pulling off a plaster, Jean-Michel Aulas waited for the unexpected moment to call time on Hubert Fournier’s reign as manager of Olympique Lyonnais.

Everyone knew it was coming, but to officially announce the decision on Christmas Eve is classic, no-nonsense Aulas. The announcement was followed up with the news that Fournier’s assistant, Bruno Genesio will take charge of the first-team.

In typical bizarre Aulas fashion, there was no mention of Fournier in the club’s official press release, just the mere mention that Genesio would be taking over first-team coaching duties. A full press conference will take place on Monday – hopefully it’ll all be cleared up then.

It has been a whirlwind 18 months for Fournier, but the demise has been much quicker than the ascent.

The final derby du Rhône at the Gerland couldn’t have gone much better for Fournier and Olympique Lyonnais.  Les Gones put their local rivals Saint-Étienne to the sword with a display of attacking football that culminated in a hat trick for Alexandre Lacazette.

It was a performance worthy of last season’s title charge and gave Lyon the springboard to launch a charge for a Champions League spot.  Unfortunately for Fournier that victory back on the 8^th of November was the last he would record in the league.  Since then Lyon have lost five and drawn one in six Ligue 1 encounters including the demoralising 2-1 defeat away at Gazelec Ajaccio.

In fact in all competitions since their last victory Lyon have only won twice in nine matches, a consolation win against Gary Neville’s Valencia in the Champions League and a nervy 2 – 1 defeat of Tours who currently sit 12th in Ligue 2 – wasn’t enough to change Fournier’s fate.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way for OL.  After a surprising title run last season with a young, energetic team this campaign was seen as the ideal opportunity to build from a position of strength.

The summer saw the arrivals of Sergi Darder, Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa, Claudio Beauvue who netted 17 league goals for Guingamp last campaign, Mathieu Valbuena signed from Dinamo Moscow, Rafael da Silva from Manchester United and Jérémy Morel pinched from rivals Marseille on a free transfer.

The likes of Clinton N’Jie, Farès Bahlouli, Mohamed Yattara, Mehdi Zeffane and Yassine Benzia were offloaded to balance the books.  Additionally, Les Gones received a handsome chunk of Anthony Martial’s transfer fee as a result of a 20% sell-on clause and could stand to receive even more should the former Monaco man meet certain targets at Manchester United.

Top performers like Alexandre Lacazette and Nabil Fekir committed their immediate futures to the club whilst Hubert Fournier and his staff were rewarded with extensions to their deals.  Off the pitch the club were being run like a well-oiled machine.

On the pitch the pre-season results could have been better but that was perceived as a case of shaking off the cobwebs rather than an indication of something more serious.

The start of the season promised much but now coming into the winter break Lyon are languishing in 9^th, five points off a Champions League position.  Aulas promised changes, Fournier’s departure may just be the start.

If the stars aligned for Lyon last season then this time around someone at the club must have stepped on a few cracks shattering numerous mirrors in the process in front of a clutter of black cats.

Nabil Fekir suffered a cruciate ligament injury against Portugal whilst on international duty for France in December.  Mathieu Valbuena has been caught up in a blackmail scandal involving former OL star Karim Benzema.

Le Petit Velo was also the subject of a hostile on his return to the Velodrome with the home crowd hanging an effigy of him.   Lyon’s game against Marseille was temporarily suspended due to crowd trouble with the away side leading 1-0 and in control.  The break only seemed to aid Marseille who battled back to secure a 1-1 draw despite being one man down.

Aulas himself was suspended by Ligue 1 authorities after an unseemly, if not entertaining, spat with his opposite number at Marseille, Vincent Labrune.

Alexandre Lacazette hit out at the Aulas and Fournier over their treatment of him before the club intervened and blamed the press for stirring things up.

And if that wasn’t enough Will.I.Am will be playing a set after the inaugural league match at the Stade des Lumières.

That said, Lyon this season have been the architects of their own downfall, luck or no luck.

Their cavalier style, so effective last term, is now proving to be a detriment with opponents cannier to the style of play and picking of the Rhône-Alpes club with clinical precision.

Despite having the likes of Milan Biševac, Samuel Umtiti, and Henri Bedimo, not to mention the impressive Anthony Lopes between the posts, Lyon’s defence has looked dishevelled and disorganised when being attacked.  This term alone has seen Les Gones ship 23 goals in Ligue 1 compared with 17 this time last season.

Yanga-Mbiwa in particular has been struggling at the back.  The summer recruit from Roma has struggled to put in any performance of note and to round things out has made L’Equipe’s Worst XI of the first half of the season.  In fact he was the poorest player by a comfortable margin.

At the other end of the pitch the attack is misfiring.  The team has scored just 23 goals this campaign compared with 40 when they entered the winter break last year.

Lacazette has notched just six league goals this campaign, 11 shy of his tally 12-months ago, and is clearly missing his partnership with Nabil Fekir.  The pair last season were at the heart of Lyon’s most incisive attacking play and seemingly instinctively on the same wavelength.

This is in stark contrast to his “understanding” with Claudio Beauvue whom is only really starting games because of the injury that befell Fekir.  Beauvue and Lacazette just cannot seem to strike up a meaningful partnership.  After a promising start to the season, the former Bastia man’s form has petered away.

He’s far from alone though as Lacazette has been underperforming, missing a vital penalty in the Champions League fixture away to Gent and not being as clinical as he was the previous term.  The lack of goals has been affecting the French international whose confidence has been hit by a bout of sub-par form and a continuing back complaint.  It’s too late now but one wonders if both Lacazette and Aulas would have been better served if the striker had departed for big money over the summer.

Add to the mix Mathieu Valbuena who has yet to show OL fans what he’s truly capable of with the diminutive forward notching just one league goal and two assists since his switch from Dinamo Kiev.  In mitigation the blackmail saga he’s had the indignity of going through cannot be easy to manage and must be weighing on his mind.  To play whilst having the media spotlight focused on a non-footballing matter cannot be easy to deal with.

Even the reliable Maxime Gonalons has lost his spark, most recently being responsible for Gazalec’s two goals that ultimately downed Lyon in Corsica.

The regression overall has been alarming and all eyes turned to face Fournier.  If last season was a thrilling ride for the former Reims manager has had an absolutely horrendous time this campaign.  Fournier’s chops have been tested to the limit both on the field and off and there’s no question that he was struggling.  The decision to let him go makes him only the second head coach Aulas has fired mid-season in 20 years.

The trusted 4-4-2 diamond was ditched for a back three against Gazelec, personnel have been switched, and tactics altered.  Short of throwing the kitchen sink, Fournier has tried practically everything to arrest Lyon’s alarming slide.  Yet he still wasn’t been able to get his side scoring whilst keeping out opponents at the opposite end.

Most tellingly was his inability to quell reported unrest within the OL camp that could prove to be his ultimate undoing.  Tales of a rift between the homegrown players and the new signings dogged Les Gones for months, the club had to admit to a training ground confrontation between Lindsay Rose and Corentin Tolisso and dissatisfaction about match preparation has hit Fournier’s reign this season.

Fournier is far from blamless, but responsibility also has to lie at the feet of the players, something that Aulas is well aware of. “It is not only the coach who is to blame, the players are also at fault,” charged the 66-year old. 

It all could see a potentially hectic winter break and busy January window for Les Gones as Aulas personally looks to arrest Lyon’s slide.  Claudio Beauvue, Lindsay Rose and Rachid Ghezzal are all rumored to be heading for the exit.

Olympique Lyonnais are looking for a light at the end of the tunnel.  It’s just as well that their next league match is at the Stade des Lumières.

Whether Lyon can get it started again upon the return from the winter break is another question entirely.

You can read more from Thariq Amir at World Soccer Talk.