Women’s Champions League
With the only goal from Guro Reiten, and despite being dominant throughout the game, Lyon fell by the bare minimum against Chelsea and became entangled in the Women’s Champions League.
The first legs of the quarterfinals of the Women’s Champions League were played this week and this Wednesday Christiane Endler’s Olympique de Lyon received Chelsea looking to strike first to guide their way to the semifinals. They failed to do so, as the English salvaged a comfortable 1-0 win.
OL confirmed the formation for this match, with Christiane Endler in goal; a defense with Ellie Carpenter, Vanessa Gilles, Wendie Renard and Perle Morroni; in midfield Damaris Egurrola, Lindsey Horan, Sara Däbritz and Dzsenifer Marozsan. Finally, in front were Eugenie Le Sommer and Delphine Cascarino.
Asimismo, Chelsea formó with Ann-Katrin Berger; Ève Périsset, Kadeisha Buchanan, Millie Bright, Jess Carter; Melanie Leupolz, Sophie Ingle; Lauren James, Erin Cuthbert, Guro Riding; Sam Kerr.
OL started the match being superior. The French came much closer to Ann-Katrin Berger’s goal and Eugenie Le Sommer was the most proactive player: she had a corner kick rejected, a puncture in the area and a mid-range shot before turning 15′, but she failed to open marker.
Until the opening came, which was not exactly French. At minute 28, Guro Reiten took advantage of a counter led by his teammates; when the ball came to him he managed to get past Ellie Carpenter and with a cross shot he beat Christiane Endler to make it 1-0 in favor of Chelsea.
The rest of the first half showed Lyon really superior, and with many more dangerous approaches, but their great karma this season 22/23 has been the definition, which also weighed on them in this game, since they could not overcome the rival goalkeeper to match actions.
Already in the complement, Lyon still had a difficult time to overcome Berger. It was a shot from Delphine Cascarino at 60′ that was the most dangerous: the rival goalkeeper deflected the ball, which finally crashed against one of the uprights and prevented the partial tie.
The rest of the game got stuck and little by little the intensity dropped, since both teams could not propose enough. Danielle Van de Dönk came close to leveling at 80′, but her ball was narrowly cleared by midfielder Niamh Charles.
Finally, Lyon did not achieve the feat and despite their 14 shots and extensive control of the ball, it was impossible to beat Chelsea and discount, so they fell 1-0 in the first leg of the quarterfinals. The second leg is scheduled for next Thursday, March 30 at 4:00 p.m. in Chile at Stamford Bridge, with the English at home.
