POOR PERFORMANCE OF THE RED STAR-OLYMPIC IN FRONT OF THE URUGUAYANS
— Gabriel Hanot | 06/06/1925 —

It could have been a great match; it was a game without balance, without struggle and without interest.

The Uruguayans, who come from Antwerp and go to Berne, then to Vienna, are not responsible for this. They fielded a team in excellent physical condition and clearly happy to play. Unfortunately the 1924 Olympic champions only found before them an eleven made up of men out of shape and very dissimilar from each other.

The Red Star-Olympique squad was made up of Chayrigués; Audin, Meyer; Falcon, Baron, Dupoix; Gosselin, Gordon, Nicolas, Mistral, Stuttler.

Chayriguès, in action from the start, quickly resigned himself to conceding goals as soon as he noticed how his full-backs and half-backs were behaving; forward, Nicolas quickly became desperate to see in what way the passes were addressed to him.

These two teammates renouncing to work hard, it is not surprising that the Entente conceded 6 goals to 0. The Parisian eleven was in fact condemned to trial and error, to hesitant, brief and isolated reactions; no player had confidence in his partner and Cordon, despite his good will and his undeniable qualities as a footballer, could not claim to be sufficient for the job alone.

So the match was the game of a single team, that of the Uruguayans, who held the ball almost continuously and who were regularly in the vicinity of the leather sphere, in numbers 3 to one.

We had the opportunity to admire the extraordinary mastery of the inside right Scarone, who dribbles, blocks, passes and shoots with perfect virtuosity and ease; the openings of the inside left Cea were also a demonstration; similarly, the saves and clearances of Mazali, goalkeeper, were admirable for their precision and flexibility.

However, we would also have liked to see the Uruguayans stimulated, pushed to action by better resistance from Parisians. We had to become disillusioned. And the four to five thousand spectators could not make up their minds. On Sunday and Monday, during the Pentecost tournament,he football fans showed the most impartial and generous sporting spirit. Yesterday, they grumbled, were chauvinistic and unfair. I admit that the volunteer referee, Mr van Doren — it is well known that official referees refuse to officiate matches for the Uruguayans, who like to think of the referee as the donkey in the fable — let everything happen and everything goes by. But impeccable refereeing would not have given the Parisian team a value it did not have, a solidarity it lacked, an ardor it was devoid of.

The crowd, perhaps less benevolent during the week, when they work, than on Sunday, a day of rest, wanted someone to blame. They attacked the referee. However, it was not him who was responsible for the unequal match!