So, what have we seen from les Auxerrois in the past few weeks? A lot, actually. Although the team went unbeaten for well over a month and was riding a five-game unbeaten streak until the loss to Stade Rennes away last week, this win shows what the team is made of. AJ Auxerre is the little club in Ligue 1, placing only 15th in attendance out of 20 with 12,653 faithful to cheer the men on, and yet they have the strength to beat last year’s Ligue 1 champions Olympique Lyonnais. Perhaps the team isn’t the strongest, nor is it the most popular, but there is no reason why, with their current form, they cannot ride their confidence and stay at least on the top half of the league. I’m not going to say that they should try for a UEFA spot, because 15 points is a lot of ground to cover, but we shouldn’t have to worry about fighting relegation anymore. If Jean Fernandez’s men can find a way to beat the champs, away from home, there is no reason why they should not find a way to beat the rest of ‘em.

Now, the little team has gotten quite lucky in winning as much as they have: Lyon practically dominated the entire game, with possession over 24% in Lyon’s favor (38% to 62%). Injuries combined with the general lack of composure from a team fighting relegation had hampered Auxerre’s play for the first half, but now there is a certain spark in the team. It’s not much, but in my opinion two things have combined to drive les Auxerrois onto their great second half thus far: the return of main striker Ireneusz Jelen, who has been on absolute fire since coming back, scoring 4 goals in the 7 games he has played since his return, and the return to overrall form thanks to a decrease in injuries. As of now Jean-Pascal Mignot and Dennis Oliech are very close to fitness, as the two have begun special individual recovery programs.

Julien Quercia, who had an operation two weeks ago on his knee due to tendinitis is only a couple of weeks from returning to the pitch. Finally Robert Popov has caught some sort of ilness, but he is expected to return next week after symptoms ease up. Hopefully, with everyone contributing, the team can continue its very nice run down the stretch and end up well in the top half of the table. Auxerre’s strength lies not in the ability to create chances, but rather to capitalize on them. So far, so good.

Here are the goals from Auxerre’s match against Lyon:

Now for the good news: our pacy striker Jelen is finally returning from injury and is expected to start today after two impressive performances in friendlies. While Julien Quercia had problems with his legs, Jelen had a problem with his shoulder. Thankfully one usually doesn’t need the shoulder to score, so expect the Polish international to bring back some much needed life into the squad. My prediction for today’s game: 2-1 Auxerre. Hey, gotta start with some optimism, right?

Now, onto my excuse. There comes a time in every man’s life when change happens. In fact there are many changes in a man’s life, so this kind of thing happens many times. As for me, I have started to attend college, and dealt with an uxepected increase in workload, I completely forgot about the blog. But alas I’ll try to post with some regularity – the little French team needs our help to stay in Ligue 1!

Hey everone – I’ve got a quick news round-up for you:

Julien Quercia stated in an interview with the official AJ Auxerre website that he has a contusion of the sciatic nerve on his knee and will be out for around 2 weeks. Missing players due to injury is never a good thing because it depletes your bench and your options and I wish him a speedy and full recovery.

Thomas Kahlenberg and Jeremy Berthod are still unavailable. The latter will be back sometime duing mid-October. Auxerre could be searching for a quick fix as rumours of acquiring either Florian Marange (Bordeaux) or Damien Tixier (Le Havre) have surfaced in the past weeks. Both Pignot and Lejenue, though both would be playing out of position, can fill in at left-back as they do have some previous experience at the position. I say we may as well wait. With one month to go before the supposed return of Berthod there is no point in making an investment for such a short period of time (3-5 games), especially if one considers the Ligue 1 season is 38 games long. As coach Jean Fernandez cooly put it to French daily Ouest-France:

“The league is a marathon.

“I will use as an example Strasbourg, who started last season very well but ended up being relegated.

“Others start badly and finish a lot better. The season is 38 matches long, we are only at the fourth weekend. We mustn’t go overboard.”

Right on Jean. If by the 10th game les Auxerrois are still underperforming, then we can start looking at things from this less-than-optimistic perspective.

And now for my short preview of this weekend’s matchup: Auxerre, though with a few injuries, will bounce back and beat Lorient 3-2. Lorient had a more dismal 3-1 loss against Valenciennes last time out and looked sluggish. This is AJA’s chance to grab a much-needed 3 points.

Finally, as a side note, if you haven’t heard yet The Offside and the World Cup Blog have a new forum! Look up or share some of your opinions on Ligue 1, France, rumours, etc. Check it out!

In Ligue 1 nowadays, unless a team is severely rocked by injuries, it is quite the trend to play with a defending line of 4. Not one, not two, but four. This allows for a stronger line of defense, but at the cost of possibly (depending on how hard the midfield wants to work on any given match day) strangling the offensive part of the game. But there’s always someone who bucks the trend, who goes against the grain. Today that man is Jean Fernandez.

“The 3-5-2 is not obsolete.”

That’s what the AJ Auxerre coach claims. With the adaptability of traditional forwards like Lejenue and Jelen les auxerrois have even played with an ambitious 5-3-2 during some points of the season, but with the loan of Romanian defender Gabriel Tamas to Dinamo Bucharest for €500,000 this week and the injuries to Berthod (2 months to go before his sprain heals) and Quercia (probably will not play this week against Lorient) the 3-5-2 looks like a sure bet to stay. This annoys me a little bit. Why, when your star summer signing is out with an injury, would you loan a developing, young star defender in the making? With Dinamo having the option to buy him for €4million Auxerre no longer controls Tamas’ future, and this is a BIG mistake. Even though Tamas failed to win a place in the squad in each of the first 2 games I have a good feeling about this guy. Romania is a great footballing country (and churns out pretty solid defenders) and when one takes into consideration Auxerre’s injuries and Tamas’ young age and promising future (he’s only 24 and a force on the field at 6′ 2″) I just don’t think AJA could afford to get rid of him.

So, to sum things up, even if AJA wanted to play along with the rest of the league by using (the way-too-overused) 4-4-2 for now the best option is simply sticking with a 3-5-2. The final verdict on whether Jean Fernandez can make it work effectively will come very, very soon, especially if some points don’t come along, too.

Now, on to the news. Les auxerrois are now 1-2 in Ligue 1 this season thanks to clumsy, sloppy losses to Marseille and Nice (4-0 and 1-0, respectively) following a good winning start after defeating promoted Nantes 2-1 at the Stade Abbe-Deschamps.

However, the loss to Nice this past weekend was especially painful, as Auxerre was the better club on the pitch. If not for a terrible penalty miss by Kevin Lejeune in the dying moments of the first half the game would have ended in a more respectable 1-1 draw. Auxerre did very well to keep posession of the ball (61% vs. 39%) and had numerous chances to break the game open. Simply put they were out of luck.

Although the flow of the game was somewhat sporadic the Nice goalkeeper Lionel Letizi had to work hard to keep strong efforts from both Jean-Pascal Mignot and Stephane Grichting out of the net in the 2nd half but the ball simply would not go in. All I can say is oh well… sometimes the better team doesn’t always come away the winner in certain matches, and this was no exception.

In other news the AJA have picked up yet another injury after promising young striker Julien Querica picked up a slight knee sprain against Nice and there’s no telling when he’ll be back. The season has barely begun and already Auxerre face an uphill battle. All is well though, because my nose tells me Auxerre won’t be one of the clubs fighting to stay in Ligue 1 this season. Coach Jean Fernandez, although unconventional for sure, will figure something out to keep this glorious little club on good level.

Quick prediction: AJA will surely finish better than the 15th spot that they finished with last season. This team is, though small, has the potential it needs to succeed. Let the season begin! (Ok, ok… I know it has already begun, but now it’s official!)

Finally here are some highlights from Auxerre’s win against Nantes:

… as well as this weekend’s loss to Nice (trust me, there weren’t many highlights against Marseille):