It took Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang until October to score his first Ligue 1 goal for Marseille having joined the club in the summer. His second didn’t come until December. Shortly after, Gennaro Gattuso was sacked by Marseille and many assumed Aubameyang would similarly end up on the Stade Velodrome scrapheap. Instead, the 34-year-old has been rejuvenated.
By Graham Ruthven
Aubameyang has scored nine goals in the nine games he has played since Gattuso’s departure. Only Kylian Mbappé, Jonathan David and Alexandre Lacazette have scored more goals in Ligue 1 this season than the former Arsenal, Barcelona and Borussia Dortmund centre forward who is enjoying an unexpected resurgence.
Jean-Louis Gasset has helped to get the best out of Aubameyang. The appointment of the 70-year-old who was infamously sacked as Ivory Coast boss during the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations – which The Elephants sensationally went on to win – looked to be a desperate move by Marseille, but his arrival at Stade Velodrome has pointed the south coast club in the right direction again.
Sitting eighth in Ligue 1, it might be too late for Marseille to mount a top four challenge, but Europa League success remains a target with the French side drawn against Benfica in the competition’s quarter-finals. If Marseille are to get their hands on a European trophy for the first time in over three decades, Aubameyang will be a driving force.
At Chelsea last season, Aubameyang looked washed up. He was disinterested and was omitted by Graham Potter from the Blues’ Champions League squad. This came after a successful spell at Barcelona where the Gabonese forward netted 11 goals in 17 games in LaLiga, but Aubameyang netted just three times in 21 appearances in a Chelsea shirt.
Now, though, he is back in form, and not just as a finisher. Indeed, Aubameyang is being harnessed as a creative force – Ousmane Dembélé is the only player to have registered more assists in Ligue 1 this season. Marseille are playing into – and playing through – Aubameyang as the focal point of their attack.
“He’s the player,” said Gasset about Aubameyang after a particularly eye-catching display by the 34-year-old against Nantes last month. “In any team, you have the player. You play him where he loves to be and then you build the team around him. He scores goals and drops back to work if he must, and even shows a measure of generosity.”
The appreciation between Aubameyang and Gasset is mutual. “He has brought serenity to the team. That is key,” said Aubameyang about the impact the veteran French coach has made at Stade Velodrome. “He arrived in a tricky context. He is calm and experienced and that’s what we needed.
“As for our relationship, it goes beyond words. He read me and made me comfortable from the moment we met. [There was] no need to speak. He put me in my favourite position. I have the freedom of a striker while playing on the left wing, which I am used to. It makes a big difference.”
To win this season’s Europa League, Marseille will have to topple some big clubs. Liverpool and Bayer Leverkusen are firm favourites to lift the trophy with both teams among the strongest in European football right now. AC Milan also have a team of attacking difference-makers while Roma are resurgent following the sacking of José Mourinho – and the arrival of Daniele De Rossi.
Nonetheless, momentum is a powerful thing in football and Marseille have already seen off Shakhtar Donetsk and Villarreal in the Europa League knockout rounds after emerging from a difficult group that included Ajax and Brighton. They have won four of the five continental matches at Stade Velodrome this season. Home advantage will be key against Benfica.
Talent has never been a problem for Aubameyang. There’s a reason he has played for clubs of the stature of Arsenal, Barcelona and Dortmund over the course of his career. Environment, however, is key for Aubameyang. Only in the right circumstances will the Gabonese striker thrive and he appears to have found those circumstances at Marseille. The club has embraced him. His career renaissance could still end in European glory.
(Cover image from IMAGO)
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