Five days before hosting Chelsea in the knockout stages of the Champions League (first leg: 2-0), Lille, lacking ideas, stumbled on Saint-Etienne (0-0) and was not reassured before challenging the Blues.
Losc also suffered a big blow with the injury exit of its creator Renato Sanches. The Portuguese, who injured his left thigh on an acceleration in the 20th minute, will probably be out of the European duel on Wednesday.
In the first leg, the former Bayern Munich player was the only Lille resident to rise to the level of the reigning European champion.
The Mastiffs, who could temporarily take fifth place, lost another two precious points at home and missed the opportunity to put pressure on their direct competitors for the European places.
With 43 units on the clock, the Northerners are in sixth place, just ahead of Nantes (42), which they will challenge at La Beaujoire next weekend.
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ASSE, solid defensively and dangerous on the counter, snatched a deserved and important point in the fight for maintenance. The Foréziens climb to 16th place with 26 points, two more than the barrage, Lorient, who travels to Clermont on Sunday.
The Mastiffs often had great difficulty creating play, like a ghostly Hatem Ben Arfa, while the Stéphanois were strong and attractive offensively, with in particular a very leggy Denis Bouanga.
Pascal Dupraz’s players posed a lot of problems for the northern defense. Thus, after a cross from Thimothée Kolodziejczak repelled in extremis by Tiago Djalo (17th), the first opportunity was the work of Mahdi Camara with a shot well blocked by Leo Jardim on a cross from Bouanga that Ryad Boudebouz had intelligently missed. (24th).
Unhappy Celik
Zeki Celik, the best Northerner on Friday, then made a decisive intervention in the area against Arnaud Nordin (29th), then his return hampered the Forézien striker who stumbled on the Lille goalkeeper (45th + 2).
The Turkish right side almost proved decisive at the other end of the field on Losc’s only opportunity: after an overflow on the right side, Jonathan Bamba centered back and the poorly cleared ball returned to Celik, who sent his shot powerful on the post (40th).
Returning from the locker room, Amadou Onana, who had replaced Sanches in the first period, harvested a superb opportunity: on a counter flash led by Jonathan David, Gabriel Gudmundsson overflowed on the left side and sent a perfect cross for the Belgian, who missed his resumption of the head six meters from the Saint-Etienne goal (48th).
Subsequently, the Lille have experienced all the trouble in the world to approach the cage of Paul Bernardoni. With only two shots on target throughout the game and significant technical waste, their statistics are indeed unflattering.
If they have chained a fifth clean sheet in a row in L1, the Mastiffs will have to do much more in the offensive animation to hope to worry Chelsea on Wednesday. And without Renato Sanches, it looks complicated …
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