Olympique Lyonnais launches its Ligue 1 season in a "calm atmosphere" after narrowly avoiding relegation

At Olympique Lyonnais (OL), from players to club employees to supporters, everyone will agree that this start to the Ligue 1 season has a special flavor. You have to have experienced the fear of heights to appreciate the little things, and the Rhône team, which could have been absent from the French football elite for the first time since 1989, now realizes how lucky it is to still be part of it. For OL, this 2025-2026 season begins with a trip to Lens on Saturday, August 16, against a coach who knows the club well.

Pierre Sage, who will be playing his first official match at the helm of the Sang et Or, has long experienced from the inside the John Textor method (the former American president of OL), his unexpected changes of direction, his dubious financial intrigues and this persistent rumor which slowly but surely sent the club to the bottom. "Seeing during the holidays "OL in Ligue 2", "DNCG" [national management control department] , it was painful. Even on holidays, it weighed on morale" , said Corentin Tolisso, the new Lyon captain, during a press conference on Thursday, August 14.

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