Metz have been one for his teams in Europe this season. The French club are struggling at the foot of the French Ligue One and the prospect of attaining safety in the remaining few months of the campaign look highly unlikely.
The club are four points adrift of safety after having played 24 matches. Despite this, manager Albert Cartier was confident ahead of the match against table leaders Lyon that his team could avoid relegation with improved consistency. The trip to face Lyon is almost certainly likely to end up as a defeat given that Lyon are showing the kind of form that gave them seven league titles in succession.
Metz have been one for his teams in Europe this season. The French club are struggling at the foot of the French Ligue One and the prospect of attaining safety in the remaining few months of the campaign look highly unlikely.
The club are four points adrift of safety after having played 24 matches. Despite this, manager Albert Cartier was confident ahead of the match against table leaders Lyon that his team could avoid relegation with improved consistency. The trip to face Lyon is almost certainly likely to end up as a defeat given that Lyon are showing the kind of form that gave them seven league titles in succession.
Cartier has identified consistency as a major issue affecting the club right now. He wants the younger players at the club to learn from the likes of Florent Malouda. The former Chelsea and France international is one high profile players at the club. Despite the motivating talks, Metz went on to suffer a 2-0 defeat against Lyon. More importantly, Malouda suffered a thigh injury that will keep him out of action for around three weeks. This comes as a major blow forCartier ahead of the upcoming matches. Metz take on the likes of Nice and Bastia.
“We were fortunate to be leading at half-time and this was our worst home display of the season. We weren’t aggressive enough in defence and watched their good players play in a passive fashion.We didn’t have enough going forward either. We need to put a run together of good displays, not just play well from time to time as we did at Nantes [in a goalless draw] in the previous game,” said Cartier. Metz have not won a single league match since the 3-2 win over Caen back in November of 2014.