Derby day in Le Mans

My disappointment on arriving in France last year that football matches here only very rarely kick off at the desirable and sensible hour of 3PM was a disappointment that I have not yet managed to rid myself of. Unlike Greggs sausage rolls and Vimto, which can be replaced by various variably viable alternatives like baguettes and Orangina, time is a fairly fixed concept. In fact, I think it is especially so to the mind of a football fan, carefully shaped by years of constructing entire weeks around a single fixed afternoon time slot. But I managed to get over it: afternoons spent at the Louvre Lens before shambling over to the tribune Delacourt for quarter past five, drugged on roman antiquity, helped. In that case, at least it was still a Saturday. Yet Friday night, and latterly Sunday evening kick offs required more forceful introspection. In the case of Fridays, what an earth was I to do the following day? Buy a dachshund and arrange a fight for it with a local rival fan? (see CoupFrank issue 6) Go to Ghent and gaze quizzically at primordial torture devices, just about stopping yourself from asking the nearest Belgian in a high vis jacket to try one of them out after your phone has alerted you of County conceding last minute away at Gillingham so as to put things into perspective? That sort of thing, you know. In truth, I’d cope with very little difficulty because I am in fact a fairly well put together human being. But it was an uncomfortable truce.

That is all to say that when I realised that I could watch Le Mans against Laval on Saturday at 2PM, I was rather content.

I caught the five euro Flixbus to Le Mans and walked into the town centre for a bit of sight seeing, though by the time I’d arrived in the city centre it was time to catch the tram, prematurely curtailing said sight-seeing. Pretty much everyone on board the tram was also on their way to the Stade Marie Marvingt. Said stadium is named after said person due to her record breaking aeronautic feats. In 1909, Marvingt was the first woman to cross the channel in a hot air balloon, making the journey from Nancy to South Wold. At the time, “La Petite République” reported that “leaving from Nancy she had no intention whatsoever to land in England, but the wind had taken the balloon over the sea.” The journalist added that “she conserves nevertheless good memories from a trip full of incidents”, which included nearly crashing into the Suffolk cliffs and landing in the North Sea. South Wold Town (of the Lowesoft and District League) really ought to organise a preseason friendly for the ages.

Back on the tram, a portion of Le Man’s ultras find themselves manning our nearest ticket scanner. A pensioner gets on board and the tallest ultra, sporting sunglasses, a black puffer jacket and one of those thin European football scarves that only the ultras are permitted to possess, says, “avez vous votre billet madame, on peut le scanner”. The old lady’s travel card then works its way through la foule of ultras, before working its way back around the other side of the pole and into her hands: an efficient service, no doubts about it. Then a couple of stops later, half of a basketball team get on at our door. We later learn, thanks to the ultras’ enquiries, that they are the Dijon espoirs (hopefuls, 21s etc’). The ticket scanning service was of course also offered to the next generation of Dijon’s 6ft 5 superstars, however this time the process is rather less smooth. For starters, the utter size of the basketballers means that their arms have to catch a lift down a couple of stories in order to reach their lower coat pockets, and then there’s the fiasco with the tickets, their temporary, paper-based nature necessitating insertion into the machine. But this is of course no problem for the ever-efficient stone island conveyor belt. One of the team’s coaches asks the senior ultra how big the Laval-Le Mans derby is. He responds that it’s a bit average. The police constabulary, banning all Laval supporters from the city centre, were not of the same opinion. But in fairness, this sort of thing is all relative; the coach is a Saint Etienne fan. Oh, he knows all about derbies. We all wish the espoirs the best of luck. Hell, we might need them if it gets out of hand come teatime.

I take my position in the top corner of the tissue box Marid Marvingt. The ultras are down to my left; I can have a sing song if I fancy, but I’m allowed to watch the game too. It’s a cagey affair for the first half, and the second, until it’s not; the Laval left winger cuts inside the Le Mans 18 yard box and it looks like a decent opportunity, until he kicks the ball a little too far. It’s rolling harmlessly out of play. But luckily for him, the Le Mans fullback has already slid in and he’s not got a bit of the ball. The resulting penalty is converted hard and low down the Le Mans keeper’s left hand side: action stations, Le Mans!

Action is what we get, because two minutes later Le Mans get the equaliser, headed in by Lucas Buades. Chances for both teams come in the final half hour. The best opportunity for Le Mans, who by this point seem to finally have the belief that they can win the match, comes seconds before the final whistle. A chaotic tap in worthy of a derby day stramash is thwarted by the long arms of Laval’s keeper, who plunges himself to the ground. 1-1 is the final score, which seems fair enough. Two points dropped for les sang et or: a derby day blip perhaps, and in any case fortunately for them they find themselves in the most competitive promotion battle Ligue 2 has seen for years. Writing this two weeks later, Le Mans are still only three points off top, occupying fifth place. Bring on the six pointers.