Lyon is counting on Guimaraes to finally take off
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Lyon (AFP) – Distanced in Ligue 1 (eleventh) and far from its ambitions, Lyon, which plays Sunday in Troyes during the 21st day (5:05 p.m.), is counting in particular on its Brazilian midfielder Bruno Guimaraes to return to the top of the table.
At the Aube stadium, OL will build on the positive points of their match against Paris SG (1-1) on Sunday to return to victory, which they have not tasted since November 28 in Montpellier. (1-0).
Against PSG, the Lyonnais opened the scoring with a goal from Lucas Paqueta, well served by a through pass from Guimaraes, one of the Rhone club’s rare satisfactions in the first half of the season. Beyond his contribution to the game, the midfielder delivered four assists.
Selected with Brazil
Paqueta like Bruno Guimaraes have just been selected with Brazil to face Ecuador and Paraguay on January 27 and February 2 for the 2022 World Cup qualifiers.
England with Arsenal, Newcastle or Everton, Italy with Juventus, AC Milan or AS Roma: Guimaraes (24) does not seem to lack requests for the future, but, above all, does not seem in a hurry to extend his contract which runs until June 30, 2024.
He arrived in Lyon in January 2020 from Athletico Paranaense for a transfer of twenty million euros.
Sports director of Olympique Lyonnais, Juninho, was then decisive in tipping the balance in favor of Lyon which was facing, at the time, competition from Atlético de Madrid.
But the former OL icon quit his job in December and Guimaraes’ performances, like Paqueta, make them targets for Europe’s top sides more than ever.
Especially if OL failed to qualify for the Champions League at the end of the season. Especially since the two players would represent an important value in terms of transfer.
“It’s normal to be asked when you are an Olympic champion, called up for selection and performing individually”, Bruno Guimaraes recently replied to the Brazilian website Globo Esporte.
“I don’t like to think about it too much and let my agents handle it,” he also said.
“Put Lyon back in its place”
“We talked about an extension with Juninho when he was still at the club. There is a change in management. When the time comes, we will talk about it. The urgency is rather to bring the team up in the standings and put Lyon in its place,” insisted the Auriverde midfielder.
He played in all Lyon’s Ligue 1 matches except for the one against Brest (1-1) on the first day.
“The club has never won the Europa League and we will fight to conquer it,” added Bruno Guimaraes about the C3, where the club finished first in its group. To achieve this, it will probably be necessary to display other values, in particular concentration.
Against PSG, once again, OL opened the scoring before being beaten back in the last quarter of an hour.
On 75 minutes, Lyon is leader of the classification but lost eleven points in the last fifteen minutes.
“We stupidly lost a lot of points at the end of the match,” admits the Olympic champion.
“But we are not going to make the same mistakes again. We talked about it a lot. We worked a lot on the video and we are going to put Lyon back at the top of the rankings,” he said, still at Globo Esporte.
The match at Troyes, which has just changed coach, Bruno Irles having replaced Laurent Batlles, will already be a first revealer for the Lyonnais on their ability to get off to a good start in 2022.
© 2022 AFP