Paris giants running out of capital
Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:51
Paris Saint Germain and Stade Français, the French capital's flagship sports sides, face an uncertain run-in to their season's end after failing to live up to their bankrolled billing.
PSG, whose last major European title was the now-defunct European Cup Winners Cup in 1996, are battling internal strife, crowd violence and general under-performance on the pitch.
Stade Français's problems by contrast have come out of the blue, the club having in recent seasons rewarded flamboyant media mogul Max Guazzini's investment of millions with five domestic titles and two losing appearances in the European Cup final.
However, Saturday's humiliating Top 14 0-29 defeat to arch-rivals Toulouse at the Stade de France sees them struggling to make the top six that go on to compete in the end-of-season play-offs.
Only Parisian rivals Racing-Metro's surprise away defeat at Montpellier prevented them from trailing the top six by eight points with just five matches of the regular season remaining.
However, even that was not enough to placate 62-year-old Guazzini, who hires out the Stade de France for Stade's key games in a bid to promote the sport to a wider and younger audience at relatively cheap ticket prices.
"This was a stain on our name and an embarrassment," he said after the Toulouse match.
"I apologise to the public for such a performance."
Guazzini's dream ever since he bankrolled the team - bringing in future France coach Bernard Laporte at the helm - has been to win the European Cup, something which remains a distant goal this season after they reached the last eight but will face an uncomfortable away trip to Toulouse.
Certainly Stade have been swimming against the tide since the early season departure of Australian coach Ewen McKenzie.
"All that has happened here is not just by chance," said Jacques Delmas, who with Didier Faugeron replaced McKenzie.
"The start of the season was complicated, one could even say traumatic."
Stade can at least rely on loyalty from the majority of their supporters even if they do miss out on the league play-offs for the first time since the 2001/02 season.
That cannot be applied so much to PSG, who have no hope of silverware or indeed a European place for next season.
The club has banned its own fans from away matches, and they reached a new low a fortnight ago when fighting amongst themselves at a Marseille match devoid of travelling fans.
Antoine Kombouare is the club's fourth manager in six years and while he was well regarded by the PSG faithful as a player, it has taken under a season for the 46-year-old to be catcalled and abused.
The poisonous atmosphere at the club was perhaps best summarised by former France international goalkeeper Gregory Coupet.
"Once more it is the image of the club that is suffering," he remarked after the PSG rival gangs fought each other.
"We don't even talk about sport or of PSG but of gangs taking each other on, without a code or dignity in a fight, only for a fight for supremacy.
"Football is a popular sport. But at the moment I would not take my children to Parc des Princes."
AFP
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