It was a good day for Giovanni Reyna and Strasbourg with a victory, but a bad day for Folarin Balogun because he has still been left off the Monaco team sheet.
Troyes 2 – 6 Strasbourg
Giovanni Reyna opened his Ligue 1 account over the weekend when he helped Strasbourg thrash Troyes by contributing a goal in a very entertaining game. The American started the game and put in a 63-minute shift for Racing. His was their third goal counts as the game-winner.
Antoine Mille struck first for the hosts and was pretty lucky with a big deflection that wrong-footed the Strasbourg keeper. The lead lasted almost until the intermission, but in the 40th and then the 42nd minutes, the visitors were celebrating the lead at the intermission. Jacobo Ortega, a product of Real Madrid’s Academy, had a simple tap-in from six yards out, followed by Diogo Sousa’s strike from roughly the same spot, after his first effort was blocked.
In the 51st minute, Reyna was released inside the box, but his low shot was grabbed by the Troyes keeper before it could reach the net. In the 57th minute, however, the American celebrated after his shot was deflected and beat Patrick Beach, who probably wished he was back home in Australia on a beach as he picked the ball out of his net.
With the game slipping away, in the last 10 minutes Troyes threw most of their team forward and paid for it on the breaks. The next three came in the 85th, 88th and 92nd minutes of play, with second-half sub, Samuel Amo-Ameyaw striking twice and then Conrad Harder bagging the last.
Strasbourg with six points out of a possible nine will Monaco, but probably not Folarin Balogun, next.
Marseille 2 – 3 Paris FC
Tim Weah was in the starting line-up at his usual right-back spot for Marseille when they hosted the capital city’s second team on Sunday night. The hero of the night, however, was Paris’ Lassine Sinayoko, who took home the game ball after putting three past Dutch keeper Jeffrey De Lange.
It was a disastrous start for Weah’s boys when they lost the ball from the kick-off and Luca Koleosho danced and dribbled around a pair of would-be defenders, before picking out Sinayoko to his right inside the box and watching the striker from Mali smash the ball into the back of the net. The disastrous part is that the goal came after just 23 seconds.
It was a short-lived lead, however, because when the clock struck eight minutes played, it was all square. The visitors were trying to be clever, playing the ball out of the back, but a sloppy back pass was seized upon by Amine Gouiri and the Algerian international said, ‘merci beaucoup’ to the Olympique defender and tucked it into the back of the net.
Sinayoko didn’t like that, however, and so the 26-year-old did it again. This one came off a corner that he nodded past the keeper from a few yards out after a display of poor marking. This one came in the 19th minute.
The second half started with the Parisians in the lead, but it wasn’t long before everything was all tied up again. And it was Gouiri yet again. With both players on a brace, surely a hat trick was inevitable; or perhaps a pair of hat tricks. A brace of hat tricks? Well, it was Sinayoko who received that honor, as well as the game-winner.
Next up will be a trip to take on Rennes, where Weah will meet up with Bryan Reynolds.
Notes
After Folarin Balogun‘s trip to England to sign for Everton FC collapsed after the American decided that he didn’t want to go there, he returned to Monaco and, yet again, is listed as injured. Because of this, he took no part in his team’s victory over the French champions, PSG, by a 2-1 scoreline. Something doesn’t seem right about his situation. As Mulder would say though, ‘the truth is out there.’
Mark McKenzie went the distance when Toulouse hosted high-flying OSC Lille and narrowly lost by a 1-0 scoreline. Next up will be a trip to Lorient.
Brian Reynolds collected splinters when Stade Rennes travelled to Angers and came away with a 2-1 victory. In Rennes first three games, the American summer signing has played a total of 2 Ligue 1 minutes. Hopefully things will change this weekend when they face Marseille.
Tanner Tessmann played 14 minutes in Lyon’s 3-1 victory over Auxerre. Next up, they’ll head to the French capital to take on Paris FC.
