Earthquake in the French championship. After examining his file on Tuesday by the DNCG, the financial gendarme of French football, Olympique Lyonnais was demoted in League 2. A shock decision that plunged the Rhodanian supporters into dread.
Former player (1970-1977) and coach (1988-1993) of the Gones, Raymond Domenech reacted to this thunderclap in the columns of
The team. The ex-selection of the Blues did not hide his ” sadness “, Before pointing the owner and president of OL, the American businessman John Textor.
“My feeling, when the administrative demotion of OL is in Ligue 2? Sadness, Retroéqué Domenech. There was everything in Lyon, we didn't need a pension fund. There was everything in Lyon to make OL remains a big club. What happened in other clubs, will still arrive in other clubs, because we are in a financial strategy and more in a sports strategy. »»
Domenech: “When you want to live above your means, a moment, you have to pay”
“” These are funds that come to make money, that just want profitability, continued the chain consultant The team. There is no longer any policy, there is no more strategy, there is no more club heart. They invested in making money hoping to resell in four, five or six years. »»
“They killed the training center, they sold women's football, they sold the room next to it (LDLC Arena),
he recalled. Everything that was profitable, they cut it into rings. Afterwards, if there are no sporting results that allow you to be at the highest level, they are in difficulty. Bordeaux did the same, for other reasons. But it is inevitable. When you want to live above your means, a moment, you have to pay. »»
While OL, present in Ligue 1 since 1989, announced quickly to call on ” This incomprehensible decision
», Raymond Domenech wants to believe in a reversal of the situation. “” I want to believe it, he launched. I want to believe that at one point, they (Lyon's decision -makers) say to themselves: “There, really, it's serious”. Until now, they had managed to juggle, to make believe that … There now, either they have the money and they put it, or they do not have it and the club will die gently. I want to believe that the fund (the Eagle group) which invested in OL is said to be: “If my product is devalued, I will have more difficulty selling it” and that it makes the effort to put it afloat. I hope. »Answer in the coming days.
