Team Focus: Uncertain Future for Lorient as Gourcuff Era Comes to a Close

Saturday evening’s draw with Evian Thonon Gaillard was Lorient’s season in a nutshell; not without merit but ultimately, deeply unsatisfying. “We didn’t deserve this point,” said coach Christian Gourcuff afterwards with some bluntness. “We were scared of playing in a forward direction, we lost the ball a lot and as we weren’t good enough in getting the ball back, we put ourselves in difficulty.”

Jérémie Aliadière, who scored the opener after 5 minutes, was similarly disarming. “We wanted to reach the bar of 40 points against a team lower down the table than us,” said the ex-Arsenal man, “but we didn’t expect that. We were running after the ball. We escaped, that’s for sure.”

Any team can have a bad night of course, but there’s the feeling that something is changing at Lorient, and not for the better. The Evian result made it just 1 win in 11 games for Les Merlus. With relegation unlikely and European qualification even more unfeasible, there is an eerie sense of inertia at a club that the adjective ‘plucky’ would previously appear to have been invented for.

An era is ending, with Gourcuff’s third spell as coach (the current one is of 11 years’ length, making him Ligue 1’s longest-serving coach by some distance) heading to a seemingly inexorable end. The Breton has not just moulded some very fine players who have gone on to fly the nest – including André-Pierre Gignac, Kevin Gamiero and Laurent Koscielny – but has shaped the club’s identity, as positive, zesty and inventive. 

There is little of that brightness about Lorient at the moment. A dispute between Gourcuff and president Loïc Féry over the summer deadline day sale of another young hope, Mario Lemina, to Marseille has driven an immovable wedge between the pair. “Nothing’s done for certain yet,” Gourcuff commented, “but contractually we’re coming to the end, and I don’t have any relationship with my president.”

It’s not quite Guy Roux leaving Auxerre, but it’s not far off. Gourcuff’s departure from Le Moustoir will leave a huge hole. It will be a considerable challenge for Féry to assure a sense of continuity at this admirably stable club.

The signs are not good as this season winds down. Last season Lorient were 8th, 10 points short of a European spot but 15 clear of relegation trouble, above better-resourced clubs such as Rennes and Toulouse, as well as 2012 champions Montpellier. They were good to watch too. There were more goals in Lorient’s games than almost anybody else’s in 2012/13 (115 total scored in Lorient’s, 116 in Bastia’s). 

The defensive caprices could be largely put down to the long injury absence of Bruno Ecuele Manga, who ruptured cruciate knee ligaments in the first game of last season against Paris Saint Germain and only returned at the end of January. 25-year-old Ecuele Manga has again been the outstanding performer for Gourcuff’s team this season, head and shoulders above his teammates, with an average rating of 7.35 in his 30 Ligue 1 starts. 

The goals, however, have not flowed so easily. This is despite the fine form of Vincent Aboubakar. The 22-year-old arrived from Valenciennes to no great fanfare, but has scored 13 Ligue 1 goals and assisted another 6 to date, including Aliadière’s on Saturday. The Cameroonian also weighed in with 4 key passes against Evian, swimming strongly against the general tide of torpor. 

Aliadière himself has not been so productive. Saturday’s goal was only the 31-year-old’s fifth of the Ligue 1 season, a disappointment after he netted 15 in the last campaign (with 9 assists to add for good measure). Given the string of injuries he has suffered since his time in England, it is clear that there is some sort of physical balancing act required to keep the forward in fettle. Fingers have pointed that the strong speculation linking Aliadière with a move to Lyon last summer – a possibility that he was not insensitive to – was destabilising, a problem which has been a running theme in Lorient’s season.

That there is a collective problem is clear. Aliadière, to take an example, has actually been more efficient this season, requiring only 2.1 shots for every goal as opposed to last season’s 3.2. One of this season’s key performers, Yann Jouffre, has had a hand in this, scoring 6 and assisting another 7 to date. Through balls and key passes are both noted strengths on his WhoScored player profile. 

Yet there has been an overreliance on Jouffre. In matches like the one against Evian, where he falls beneath his normal standards (he rated just 6.2, the joint-lowest in the starting XI), and Lorient struggled to create. They had just 3 shots on target to Evian’s 6 on Saturday. 

They are missing the best of Alain Traoré, who started last season superbly (6 goals in 5 assists in 14 starts) before succumbing to injury. Benjamin Corgnet also contributed with 5 goals and 4 assists in 24 starts, despite being unsettled by shifts between various midfield and attacking positions. He has weighed in nicely for Saint Etienne this season after moving in the summer. 

Accordingly, Les Merlus currently languish in 14th, 9 points above the relegation zone but now only 3 ahead of 17th-placed Evian. The continued struggles of wealthier neighbours Rennes has perhaps detracted from their problems, but those problems are very real. 

So what does the future hold? In this of all seasons, nobody should need reminding that the succession of a long-serving coach is a problematic task. The new man will simply have to be on the ball in terms of bringing through the next generation too. Only Aboubakar and Ecuele Manga really stand out as bankable assets, with Jouffre 29 and Aliadière 31. The uncertainty must be ended quickly to assure the long-term. 

Do you see a way for Lorient to replace Gourcuff successfully? Let us know in the comments below