For the goal, there was a pass in the centre, a great flick on by Djibril (Cissé). I looked Coupet in the eye, rounded him and put it away. With my first chance, I rushed it a bit, so with the second I wanted to take my time and round the keeper. It was match point in the 90th minute, and I made the effort to accelerate into space. When I raised my head, Coupet was in front of me. I should have slotted it straight away, but he raced out good and fast. I tried the dribble but then Abidal cleared off the line.
We got an important point, even though we wasted some chances and Coupet had an awesome game. Lyon could have won too, but Cédric (Carrasso) played a fantastic match. We used all our weapons to fight it out. We fell behind and it’s not easy to get back into a match in Lyon. But we managed to do it with sheer courage. We could even have overtaken them, we found the fighting spirit that has eluded us recently.
Lyon was there to play and they didn’t sit back and defend their lead the way most teams do at the Vélodrome, which created an open match with lots of chances on goal. We prefer the space created when teams play their game rather than sitting back, it’s easier for us that way.
Clerc made me do a lot of defensive work every time he hooked up on an overlap behind me. Equalising in such a match isn’t a straightforward proposition, but you have to be able to make sacrifices for the team.