When Baresi remembers not having “respected OM” in 1991
Emmanuel LANGELLIER, Media365: published on Tuesday, November 01, 2022 at 5:14 p.m.
In 1991, OM eliminated AC Milan, the best club in the world at the time, in the quarter-finals of the Champions League. The second leg was marked by a light failure, which is why the Italians did not want to resume the game. Franco Baresi, the rossonero captain, remembers it and deeply regrets it.
Olympique de Marseille is the only French club to have won the Champions League. “Forever the first”, like to remind OM supporters who also take malicious pleasure in chambering their PSG counterparts, who also won a European Cup, but not the C1, with the C2 , the former Cup Winners’ Cup (disappeared in 1999), in 1996. Before win the timpani in 1993 OM had reached the final of the Big Ears Cup in 1991…
And the Milanese left the field due to a lighting failure…
That year, with Pascal Olmeta, Manuel Amoros, Eric Di Meco, Basile Boli, Carlos Mozer, Bernard Casoni, Jean-Pierre Papin, Chris Waddle and Abedi Pelé, the southern club lost in Bari, Italy, to the end of a shootout but marked from the start by the failure of Amoros. The five opposing shooters had converted their try and won the Red Star of Belgrade (0-0, 5-3 on pens). Fallout of Spartak Moscow in the semi-finals (3-1, 2-1), the Marseillais had offered themselves the great AC Milan in the quarters.
Baresi: “We had lost the habit of defeat”
At the time, Milan won everything, armed with their Dutch trio Marco van Basten-Ruud Gullit-Frank Rijkaard. After a very good 1-1 at the Giuseppe-Meazza stadium in the first leg, OM led 1-0 at the Vélodrome stadium in the return thanks to a fantastic volley from Waddle when the Milanese refused to resume play due to a lighting failure. The referee then interrupted the match in the 88th minute and OM finally won the match 3-0 on green carpet. In the Italian ranks there were Franco Baresi , captain rossonero and one of the best defenders of all time. 31 years later, the transalpine libero has not forgotten and regrets having left Marseille. “Thinking back to this episode, you say to yourself: ‘We weren’t able to accept the defeat that was looming. We didn’t respect OM.’ We lost the used to defeat. With the floodlight incident, we clung to the idea of the match being replayed. We can always make excuses, the tensions of the match, the confusion on the field. But we forgot the essential, respect for the adversary”, recalls, in L’Equipe, Baresi who released his autobiography “Free to dream”. The Italian central defender, World Cup finalist in 1994, had hung up in 1997 after 20 long years of careers spent in the same red and black jersey.