PSG-Marseille: How Neymar and Alvaro Gonzalez's messy spat sparked a new fire into Le Classique - CBSSports.com
PSG-Marseille: How Neymar and Alvaro Gonzalez's messy spat sparked a new fire into Le Classique
PARIS -- Le Classique returned with a bang this season while spending years as more of a footnote to Paris Saint-Germain's domestic domination than an fair contest between two sworn enemies with Neymar a well-known influence in the revival of the grudge match with Olympique de Marseille.
Les Parisiens beat Les Phoceens 2-1 at RC Lens' Stade Bollaert on Wednesday to win the Trophee des Champions but also to take a measure of revenge while OM won an ill-tempered Ligue 1 recovers 1-0 at Parc des Princes in a match that saw five red cards and 14 yellows brandished.
Although he was only fit enough for a 25-minute substitute achieve in northern France, Neymar packed a lot into that cameo with the winning goal from the penalty spot to cap a bewitching showing in which he was target of heavy tactics from the likes of Marseille's Alvaro Gonzalez and more fouls than anybody else over the entire 90 minutes.
The Brazil international was not overjoyed to end the fun with his clown celebration failed to the Spaniard as he proceeded to give a very obvious indication of his desire to commit his future to PSG with his post-match celebrations by continuing to take the fight to Alvaro via social media.
Neymar, 28, posed the OM man, "king, right?" with Alvaro replying that his parents always taught him to "take out the trash" to which the €222 million man retorted "and you forgot how to win titles" by Alvaro responded with an image of Pele and "eternally in the sad of the king."
The very public exchange used with Neymar laughing and telling his opponent that he is in his sad claiming to have made the former Villarreal CF, RCD Espanyol and Real Zaragoza man "famous" in a nod of the head towards their rank spat back in mid-September.
That night in Paris, Neymar accused Alvaro of racism and the obsolete Barcelona man was then accused of the same and although no further frfragment was taken against either player due to insufficient evidence, the rivalry had already boiled over to levels unseen for nearly 20 years.
Not staunch the days of Fabrice Fiorese's 2004 betrayal in swapping the capital for Provence and Sylvain Armand seeing red for savaging him 20 minutes into his Classique baptism to the exquisite of the projectile-throwing Parc des Princes crowd has there been as much mutual vitriol.
Le Classique did not need a racist rank to be put back on the European soccer map, but it did need a the majority injection of genuine emotion on both sides for PSG to take Marseille seriously anti and for OM to see themselves as closer to equals than they have been in many years.
A combination of Neymar, Andre Villas-Boas and a series of closer encounters in unique years has created this equilibrium and although September's extremity was the first Marseille win since 2011 at Stade Velodrome and even longer in Paris, it had been on the cards for some time.
Back in October 2017, Neymar's gracious Classique with PSG, he scored, was beleaguered by fans throwing objects and was then sent off for two bookings as OM came within seconds of a 2-1 win only to be denied by a spectacular Edinson Cavani free-kick deep into damage time -- greeted like a win in Paris.
The behindhand February, it was toward the end of a 3-0 win over Marseille that Neymar suffered the gracious of his two crippling metatarsal injuries that derailed his gracious two seasons at Parc des Princes and clashes with RC Strasbourg Alsace have likewise gained in animosity due to being the novel villains.
Neymar aside, Rudi Garcia came finish to engineering a victory over PSG in late 2018 when Kylian Mbappe's mind as a substitute for disciplinary reasons -- he and Adrien Rabiot were late to Thomas Tuchel's pre-game meetings -- changed the game for the visitors to extremity in a 2-0 win.
However, it was Villas-Boas who made the tactical breakthrough with a disciplined and in-your-face setup intended to provoke PSG to prevent them from dictating the game which is what remained and enable Marseille to leave Paris with all three points in return this season.
The Portuguese played pantomime villain on Wednesday with his bitter bleating post-match that PSG were celebrating "as if they had won the Champions League," but he has also made OM more improbable again in recent seasons and deserves credit for that and returning France's only European champions to continental soccer's top table.
Now that the rivalry no longer feels as one-sided as it has been at times precise the start of the Qatar Sports Investments era when the champions have racked up four goals in the gracious half or demoralized Marseille 5-1 at the Velodrome, the animosity has started to return.
Bans on travelling fans due to fears of hooliganism have also hampered Le Classique's rebirth and will probable continue to do so when COVID-19 finally becomes less of an converse, but it very much feels like this movement has witnessed the restoration of this classic European soccer rivalry.
Soccer deprived of supporters feels empty at this time but ages of a rivalry with fans but deprived of a feeling of genuine competition has also been damaging in its own way -- we could now be witnessing the shock of gloriously dirty new chapter in already storied history of this grudge match.
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