AS Saint-Etienne : the unusual stories that feed the legend | ASSE News

1936: crossed brawls and confiscated recipe

The bickering between Stéphanois and Lyonnais does not date back to yesterday. On a purely historical level, we even learn that the rivalry has lasted for two centuries!

But on the football field, it did not take very long for disagreements to emerge either.

Between 1933 and 1935, the first matches between the already professional Greens and the amateur players of FC Lyon do not particularly mark the memories.

Stillborn pro football in Lyon

The meeting of March 29, 1936, on the other hand, was the first to be remembered.

The opposition between the footballers finally pros of Lyon Olympique Villeurbanne, the result of the merger between Lou and AS Villeurbanne, and those of ASSE, turns into a fist fight: fights break out on the Villeurbanne lawn of the Iris stadium – mixing players, managers and referees!

Two Lyonnais even come to blows between them. And an LOV leader steals the revenue from the match to pay his players, refusing to share it with the Stéphanois camp and the Federation.

Result: there will be no more pro football in Lyon for the next six years …

1950: OL unveils its name and its coat of arms in the Chaudron

Olympique Lyonnais: a name that seems to ring since the dawn of time in the ears of OL fans.

However, and obviously, not always existed and, even if it does not date from yesterday, this name was not registered, after all the previous procrastination, until 1950.

New jersey, new logo

A few weeks after this official creation, on August 4, 1950 precisely, it is at the Geoffroy-Guichard stadium that the Grimonpont, Ninel, Rolland, Tichy and other Dupraz, who are preparing to start in D2 with their new professional club, release the jersey stamped with a brand new “OL” logo, which has seen a lot of land since.

The key to this friendly opposition: a 1-0 victory for the Stéphanois. But Lyon will take its revenge, again friendly, with a prestigious success, 2-0, on August 11 at Gerland.

1960: ASSE lends … its goalkeeper for a match at OL

Can you imagine, in the 21st century, a Greens goalkeeper kindly loaned to Olympique Lyonnais to help out, the time of a match?

What would pass today for a heresy has, however, already happened.

Before facing Cologne in the European Cup on October 12, 1960, OL was in fact out of goalkeeper: Marcel Aubour, the incumbent, was called up for the France Espoirs team and his replacement, Claude Hugues, was injured. .

Other times, other customs: the Lyon club asks, via an official letter, ASSE to lend it its goalkeeper, who is more the prestigious Claude Abbes … And the Saint-Etienne club accepts.

Claude Abbes injured at half-time

So here is the Forézien international porter of attack to remove all the German fire from the Lyon cage. But, last rebound, Abbes is injured before half-time!

Although reduced, Claude Hugues must therefore finish the match and concede three goals in the second half.

OL will ultimately lose 3-1, but will gain stripes in the courtesy department: the Lyon club will not fail, after this meeting, to send letters to its neighbor from Saint-Etienne to inquire about its goalkeeper.

1969: four Greens in the OL jersey

The match between France and Hungary, on February 12, 1969 in Gerland, is surely not an international meeting like the others in the memory of Georges Bereta, Bernard Bosquier, Jean-Michel Larqué and – above all – Hervé Revelli.

These four Saint-Etienne stars of the time, selected from the Blues, will have the “privilege” to evolve while wearing the jersey of … OL.

The Hungarians indeed wear white tunics, like the tricolors. All this stings the eyes a little, especially for a black and white TV broadcast, and therefore a solution must be found quickly.

The only one in stock: the Lyon club lends its red jerseys from the time to the Blues and presto, we can whistle the start of the match.

Hervé Revelli, goalscorer at Gerland

Final verdict: 2-2 between France and Hungary, with in particular a pawn signed Revelli, who remains to this day (with Fleury Di Nallo, also credited with 14 goals on the Lyon side) the top scorer in the history of the Derby.

1969: a hell of a flop on TV

Live football matches on TV are all the time these days. But in the 1960s, retransmissions were rare, and for good reason …

The derby has indeed paid the price for one of the first experiments of its kind in France. And the least we can say is that this test resulted in a hell of a flop!

Only one half-time broadcast

On March 23, 1969, the derby between OL and ASSE in Gerland was therefore chosen by the ORTF for a somewhat wobbly live performance.

“At that time all the teams were sponsored by Vittel. The television refused to broadcast this advertisement on the jerseys”, recalled Philippe Gastal, curator of the Musée des Verts, in 2017.

Neither one nor two, the TV chooses to broadcast only one half (the second), the time that the two teams can still honor their sponsor.

And the cameras thus miss the first of the three goals of the match, won 2-1 by Saint-Etienne.

For the record, the TV image is also very dull, because there was a downpour on Lyon that day.

And the crowd at Gerland is in tune with this sad broadcast: 7,625 spectators, the smallest total of fans in the history of the derby.

1972: Fleury Di Nallo acclaimed in Sainté

Lyon players did not hear only bird names during their visits to the Geoffroy-Guichard stadium.

Fleury Di Nallo can attest to this: he received at least once the ovation of the speaker from Saint-Etienne, it is true in very specific circumstances.

This November 11, 1972, we are not playing a derby in the Cauldron, but a meeting organized in tribute to the former Yugoslav defender of ASSE Vladimir Durkovic, who played in the Forez between 1967 and 1971 and who left for Sion, was assassinated by a drunk Swiss policeman in June 1972.

The friendly match that will follow a few months later pits a selection of players from Saint-Etienne and Marseille against a team of Yugoslavs playing in France.

A goal for the Greens … in the OM jersey!

Moved by Durkovic’s sad fate, Lyonnais Fleury Di Nallo offered to participate in the event. Accepted!

What is worth to the emblematic striker of the gones to evolve, under the jersey of OM (the Yugoslavs played with the green tunic), alongside some of his great rivals from Saint-Etienne.

And to the cheers of the 15,000 fans present that evening in the Cauldron, the Little Prince of Gerland scored the third goal of the Stéphano-Phocaean mix, winner 3-1 of this poignant demonstration.

1978: Bernard Lacombe gets the wrong locker room

Some OL supporters may have trouble remembering it, but Bernard Lacombe, a key figure in the history of the Lyon club, played a season in Saint-Etienne.

During the 1978-1979 financial year, the one who was the great goalscorer of the gones and still excels in the France team is indeed engaged with the Greens by President Roger Rocher -a transfer which at the time allows to save the OL from bankruptcy.

Obviously, in this improbable configuration, Lacombe is called upon to face his former team, which remains that of his heart – and which, another snub, is dragged that season by a former glory of ASSE, a certain Aimé Jacquet .

And the following episode remains engraved in the great history of the derby: before the first leg at Gerland, at the very start of the season on August 18, 1978, the neo-Stéphanois finishes the warm-up and returns to the locker room … of the OL.

Non-existent on the way out, scorer on the return

Disturbed, “Nanard”? Still, during this meeting, lost 2-0 by Sainté, it is simply non-existent.

Impeccable professional, he will do better on his return to Geoffroy-Guichard: on December 16, 1978, he will score the first goal of the 3-0 managed by the Greens against Lyon.

1985: Geoffroy-Guichard chants “Go OL!”

Another improbable episode between Stéphanois and Lyonnais occurs when ASSE and OL both play in the second division, in a championship split into two national pools, the first two of which climbed to D1.

But this time, the report is indirect – the two clubs do not clash – and, (too) rare, not at all hostile.

On April 19, 1985, the Greens receive and curry Martigues (4-1), which is not enough for their happiness. To take the lead in their group, the Stéphanois must indeed also count on a defeat of Nice, which at the same time receives OL, coached by … Robert Herbin.

“Back then it was fashionable to come to the stadium with your radio”

The gones, not at the top this season, will nevertheless create the feat and win 3-1 against the Aiglons.

“At the time, it was fashionable to come to the stadium with your radio,” Philippe Gastal, the curator of the Musée des Verts, told us in 2017.

The information of the Lyon victory thus circulates in the spans of Geoffroy-Guichard, of which some of the 10,000 spectators intone a valiant “Come on OL, thank you Herbin!” inevitably remained in the memories.

1990: an unexpected tackle … and unfriendly

Who remembers David Brockers? Not many people in the world of football, no doubt: this striker, born in Puy-en-Velay in 1969, does not have the career he had probably dreamed of.

A young growth of ASSE in 1990-91, the player is however not a complete stranger: he is even the unfortunate hero of the last friendly derby to date, and his name will certainly mean something to the followers of the Greens and the ‘OL.

On July 7, 1990 in Feurs, in the Loire, this preparatory meeting is about to end, ten against ten after two exclusions and multiple clashes and other clashes, when the famous Brockers overflows on his side and is made tackle… by a Lyon supporter who entered the lawn!

Congratulations from Raymond Domenech

For the anecdote, OL ended up winning 2-1 in the Forez. And the Lyon supporter got away without remonstrance, and even, as he himself told Vice in 2017, with the congratulations of Raymond Domenech, coach of the gones at the time!

Since this incident, there has been no more friendly match organized in the summer between Stéphanois and Lyonnais.

And, as the rivalry between the two camps took a turn less and less good-natured, there were less and less of these small unusual stories which nourished the legend of the derby so much.