Unheard of for 26 years. AJ Auxerre has obtained the best total this season (74 points) for a third in Ligue 2. “With this number of points, you should be at the top”, said coach Jean-Marc Furlan at a press conference on Wednesday, May 25. Yes, but since 2017, the last step of the podium no longer offers direct access to Ligue 1. The Icaunais club therefore faces, Thursday May 26 at 7 p.m., AS Saint-Etienne, 18th in Ligue 1, in a match go accession roadblocks. AJA already had, last week, to beat Sochaux (5th in L2) in the playoffs … itself a scorer for Paris FC, 4th in the antechamber, a few days before. You follow ?
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AJA qualifies for the Ligue 1 play-offs after an unbreathable game #AJAFCSM pic.twitter.com/oFMqYbw4Oe
— AJ Auxerre (@AJA) May 20, 2022
“It’s really the obstacle courseconfirms to franceinfo: sport Omar Daf, coach of the Franche-Comté club. The team that manages to rise will do quite a feat, it’s so hard.” In four editions, only Troyes has overthrown a Ligue 1 formation, Lorient, in 2017. But it was then a simple round-trip dam, without playoffs.
Fifth in 2018-19 and victorious in two away playoff games, RC Lens had come up against Dijon in the play-off (1-1, 1-3), after an error by their goalkeeper. A penalty not granted put an end to the Toulouse dream last year in Nantes (0-1, 1-1). Hopes of a rise shattered by strokes of fate, after 38 intense days of the regular season.
For Sochaux, the mass was said on penalties (4-5) in Auxerre on Friday. A match played three days after the one won by the Doubistes in Paris in a surprising final. “And we played the Saturday before against Dijon for the 38th day”, recalls Omar Daf. Three matches in six days, plus the possible round-trip barrage: the pace is difficult to sustain for clubs with shorter squads than those in Ligues 1. “We should play these playoffs on Wednesday and Sunday, rather than Tuesday and Friday”continues the Sochaux technician.
When Ligue 2 clubs battle in physically and mentally grueling cleaver matches, the 18th in Ligue 1 is less in demand. Difficult not to see an advantage for the resident of the elite, even more with a return match at home. “For me, these play-offs are an aberration. Why don’t we draw lots to find out where we are going to play?” lambasted ex-Toulouse coach Patrice Garande last year at a press conference.
The question arises all the more for Saint-Etienne, still in the race to maintain despite 32 small units. Do the Greens deserve their place in the top flight more than the Auxerrois who set a new record? The famous adage that 42 points rhyme with maintenance seems, in part, over, especially when the 18th can save themselves. Survivor of the 2019 play-offs, Dijon totaled 34 points at the end of the Ligue 1 season. Since the introduction of the system, the average of points for the first non-relegation player has fallen from 41 to 37.
Established in the form of a compromise between the LFP, in favor of two descents and the FFF, attached to the three relegations, this system will no longer be in force next year. With the top two divisions expanding to 18 clubs, four elite clubs will descend for just two promotions to Ligue 1. Places at the top of the table will be even more expensive in Ligue 2.