Allez Lyon!!!

Lyon:

Lloris
Reveillere - Cris - Bodmer - Kallstrom
Juninho - Toulalan - Makoun
Govou - Fred - Benzema

Bench: Vercoutre, Boumsong, Kallstrom, Ederson, Piquionne, Mounier

Bayern:

Rensing
Oddo - Breno - Lucio - Lahm
Schweinsteiger - Demichelis - Ze Roberto - Ribery
Klose - Toni

Bench: Butt, Van Buyten, Podolski, Ottl, Van Bommel, Sosa, Borowski

Feel free to post commentary, frustrations, and thoughts here during and after the game.

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Dear Lyon,

Don't screw this up.

Hugs and kisses,

Me

Lyon:

Lloris
Reveillere - Boumsong - Bodmer - Kallstrom
Makoun - Toulalan - Juninho
Govou - Fred - Benzema

Bench: Vercoutre, Gassama, Cris, Mensah, Pjanic, Ederson, Piquionne, Mounier

Fiorentina:

Frey
Zauri - Kroldrup - Dainelli - Vargas
Kuzmanovic - Melo - Montolivo - Almiron
Gilardino - Mutu

Bench: Storari, Donadel, Jovetic, Gobbi, Jorgensen, Santana, Pazzini

Feel free to post commentary, frustrations, and thoughts here during and after the game.

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France turned in a woeful performance to open their World Cup qualifying campaign, one they will want to forget. Austria opened the scoring with two very similar free kicks, with France looking like they didn't know what they were doing.

It was a collective failure to defend set pieces, but Mexes, on the first goal was horribly exposed. Click to continue reading...

Okay, let's look at the bright side.

Um...

I know there's something...

Oh, got one! Actually, more than one!

1) Jérémy Toulalan gets better every game, and is looking more attack-minded as well. He's becoming less wary about shooting from distance, which can knock defenses off guard a good thing, as our offense can be extremely predictable.

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L'équipe has the probable first 11 for France's opening world cup qualifier on Saturday :

Mandanda
Sagna, Mexès, Gallas, Evra
Govou, L. Diarra, Toulalan, Nasri
Benzema, Henry

In North America, Setanta will be showing both of France's upcoming world cup qualifiers on same-day tape delay:

Setanta broadcast at 4:00 p. Click to continue reading...

A new coach, several new players, new tactical systems...so I figured it was time for another team building exercise.

I can't resist this picture. It's Lyon to a T.

Between friendlies and the first few competitive games, we've gotten a vague idea about the kind of team Puel wants to form - tactically organized, defensively solid, players sticking to their roles (as opposed to last season, where players would be out of position all the time).

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From l'Equipe. No huge surprises for starters, but it's good to see Mexès starting. And I'm interested to see what Sagna can do, too.

Malouda and Govou feel like a weak attacking midfield. Are either Toulalan or L. Diarra going to help them out, do you think?

Le onze de départ : Mandanda - Sagna, Mexès, Gallas, Evra - Govou, Toulalan, L.

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Well, Samir, didn't last long.

He was on The List for less than twenty-four hours. Now he's off again due to a "slight thigh problem."

Gotta hate those slight thigh problems.

The final squad is only nineteen. Does this mean that there will be only one player who doesn't make the bench?

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Benzema celebrates after scoring Lyon's only goal in last year's 2-1 loss to Lorient.

This week, Lyon travel to Brittany to face FC Lorient at Le Stade Moustoir. Lorient is currently tied for 2nd place with seven other teams in L1, having defeated Le Mans 1-0 in the first week.

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Forgive this abbreviated match preview, but I'm in the middle of trying to find a new apartment, so things are a bit chaotic in my life at the moment. I'd a nice, long preview planned for the first game of the season, but I guess that will have to wait until next week.

August 10, 2008
Stade de Gerland, Lyon
3 PM Eastern time (21:00 CET, 20:00 GMT)

Toulouse is always annoying to play against, but now that Johan I-love-to-score-against-Lyon Elmander is at Bolton and Achille Pain-in-the-ass Emana is at Real Betis, hopefully things will be a little easier.

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So Lassana Diarra is the next leader of France and is a favorite of Raymond Domenech, yet he couldn't get into a game for France during Euro 2008. I have a lot of respect for Lillian Thuram, he was one of the best defenders that I've seen play the game. I also rate Diarra very highly, but something doesn't quite make sense here. Click to continue reading...