French Ligue 2, Saturday 31st January
The last Saturday afternoon & indeed the last day of January (thank goodness!!!) saw me at a new ground and new visit to Dunkirk in Northern France for a Ligue 2 match up between hosts USL Dunkerque and visitors FC Annecy, who had made what was around 7-8 hour trip one way to play this, such is the enormity of this country.
Now the hosts were coming into this contest in sixth spot and just a point outside the play off zone and in fact were only, ok I say only, eight points off the leaders, the visitors Annecy, well they were in tenth spot and five points behind their opponents in the table, so that's six points off the top five, therefore the hosts knew a win could take them into the play off positions, but a win for Annecy could take them ever closer to the top five in the standings.
After finding a car park nearby, we had a quick look around the outside of what is a very unique stadium, but with plenty of time to kick off we headed into Dunkirk for a walk about and took in some sights., it's a very nice place and lots to go and look at, anyway after a nice stroll we headed back to the Stade Marcel Tribut to head into the ground and see what it was like inside.
It's basically a ground with two big stands on each side, you come in behind one of the goals and up some stairs and walk round to the seating areas past some small kiosks serving drinks and even a small stand selling some merch, then under the stand we were in they served nice baguettes, we plumped for the Ham & Cheese one, which was ok, and then grabbed a beer from the beer stall.
It's not a bad facility really and as said, unique, which I don't mind because to many grounds these days are the same really, but this one certainly gives you good views of the pitch, so that is good, it holds just under 5,000 and it was pretty much full with 4,700 in attendance, so not a bad turnout at all, the visitors, who are housed in a small seated temp stand it looks like which was surrounded by fencing, only had about 15-20 fans there, but it is a long old journey!!!
Would they be the ones going back on that long journey the happiest, well, it was them who grabbed the lead in the 26th minute, a lovely ball through from Rambaud sent Billemaz though on goal, and he duly slotted past keeper Niflore and send the small band of visiting fans wild, although cruelly the goalscorer ran the away from them rather than go and celebrate with them!!!
Could Dunkerque respond, well not really, they spent a lot of time passing the ball from side to side in their own third, but when they did ping balls long down the wing, they managed to find a route in behind, but they were unable to capitalise on this on the occasions they did try this, Annecy were dangerous too when they did get into attacking areas, but no more goals were forthcoming in the first period.
The hosts did quicken up their play early in the second half and were starting to pass the ball with more gusto, and the visitors had to defend well to keep them at bay, but as the half wore on it kind of went back to how it had been in the first period, and you could sense the frustration amongst the home crowd.
Could they find a later leveller, well, as we were walking back around the ground to the exit, it looked as if they had done when they were played in on goal and the ball was swept home, but, the flag had gone up and the goal was ruled out for offside, which kind of summed up the hosts afternoon, and after a few more tense moments for the visitors who were trying all they could to waste time and keep the ball in the corner in front of a very angry ultras area, the whistle blew and the visitors could celebrate a very good win.
It means Annecy go up two places to eighth and only two points behind sixth placed Dunkerque and now just three points from the top five, it's as you were for the hosts who would have gone into fifth with a win, but this was a disappointing day for them in the main.
Full time Dunkerque 0 Annecy 1
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