This football season at Stade Lavallois will be different in many ways. Laval has not tasted Ligue 2 games since May 2017. And the championship calendar is new due to several events. It is first of all the first time that a World Cup will be played in winter and in Qatar (November 21 – December 18). The Tangos will not play from November 12 to December 26. And the withdrawal of Bordeaux, demoted to National by the DNCG, also leads to a period of three weeks without playing a match (from September 18 to October 8).
“We will take the opportunity to work on the bottom because it’s been so long since a championship ended in early June“explains coach Olivier Frapolli. The last Ligue 2 match is indeed scheduled for June 2, 2023 in Amiens.”This year the break comes in November and not in December, so we will finish with six big months of competition. It will be very very hard physically and mentally. We will take advantage of the periods without playing to regenerate the group“continues the Stade Lavallois technician.
Start with your feet on the floor
Rarer in the National Championship, weeks with three matches will be more frequent in Ligue 2 for Olivier Frapolli’s men. The first sequence of its kind arrives at the end of August with a trip to Nîmes (27th), the reception of Le Havre (30th August) and a trip to Sochaux (2nd September). Ditto at Christmas where Laval will chain three meetings in seven days (Caen, Dijon, Valenciennes). “The summer schedule is extensive with six matches, the first of which kicks off on July 30. It will be very demanding from the start“ warns Olivier Frapolli.
The Bordeaux stranger
The absence of the Girondins de Bordeaux, barring an improbable reversal of the situation, leads to the elimination of two games in the season. Laval was to play the club at the scapular on October 1 at Le Basser and on May 20 away. The Mayenne would get two extra weekends to rest. “Yes, but our confrontations with them were not necessarily well placed” the coach tempers.
“On the first leg we had to play them after the international break. So there we have been three weeks without matches. But hey, that’s luck. I hope that the Girondins will return to Ligue 2“. Whatever happens, the demotion of a legendary club is not good news for the attractiveness of the championship.