[typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]While Paris St. Germain celebrated their return onto the big stage with a stylish 4-1 victory over Dynamo Kiev, the smaller Paris clubs, Paris FC and Red Star FC 93 laboured to a tedious draw at Stade Charlety.[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”24″ size_format=”px”]Stade Charlety[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]The stadium, located on the southern edge of Paris, represents a blend of Munich’s Olympic Stadium with the tent like roof constructions on both sides of the main stand and Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium with its gently swung roof encircling the two tiered ground. As exciting as the ground looks from the outside, inside it is bonjour tristesse: grey concrete everywhere and grey seats, which make the pitch and the track stand out. Sadly, this can’t be said about the match.[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”24″ size_format=”px”]Anxious Football[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]What caught the eye immediately, was the magnificent away support of Red Star who sang and pushed their team forward for the entire 90 minutes of the game. Roughly 100 hard core fans gathered in the opposite stand and made themselves heard, which was not too difficult as the ground was sparsely filled; just about 500 people were in attendance.[/typography] [typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]And what they were offered was not pleasant. The first half was uneventful. Both teams gave great attention to their defences, which stifled any attacking flair, if that was present at all in the first place. Red Star appeared to be more cohesive as their actions looked slicker, more purposeful. Quite the contrary has to be said of Paris FC. Any ideas or surprising elements were missing in their forward play. Both teams waited for an error of the opponent and thus cancelled each other out. It was anxious football par excellence.[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”24″ size_format=”px”]The Game improved[/typography]

[typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]As uneventful as the first half was, the second half saw a clear improvement and in particular the last 20 minutes provided some entertaining football for the crowd. Whether this was due to a shellacking both teams received during half time or the dropping temperatures forced them to move in order to keep warm, remains unknown, but the game certainly improved. It was mostly Red Star now making an effort to find an opening in the tight defence of Paris FC. To their credit, they did not give up after the initial attempts failed. With 20 minutes gone in the second half, Red Star clearly had the game under control and after 68 minutes they seemed to be justly rewarded. However, the goal was not allowed as the refereeing team spotted an infringement by Pierre Gibaud. It was another 20 minutes later, almost with the final whistle, when Paris FC created an opening but were denied by a goal line save by Franck Queudrue.[/typography] [typography font=”Alike” size=”14″ size_format=”px”]The game came to a close after another attack by Red Star. With the points shared equally, Red Star move up to 12th place in the table, one point above the danger zone, whereas Parsi FC are firmly set in the red zone on 17th place with just 7 points from 8 matches. Live for both does not get easier as the next opponents are FC Rouen (10th place) for Paris and CA Bastia (15th positin) for Red Star and with such performances survival in this division seems an unsurmountable task.[/typography]