OL, too strong for Paris, offer themselves a 10th final
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Paris (AFP)- Here are the queens of Europe in the final again: Lyon, seven times winner, confirmed on Saturday its return to the fore by dominating without contest its national rival, Paris SG (2-1), to offer itself a 10th final of the League of women’s champions against Barcelona.
After a white season, without the slightest title, the Lyonnaises made the experience speak six days after a controlled first leg (3-2), in the wake of Ada Hegerberg and Wendie Renard, scorers in an incandescent Parc des Princes.
Less than two years after their last coronation, the “Fenottes” will therefore already taste the adrenaline of a continental final, on May 21 in Turin.
And this one looks good, between the major team of the last decade, OL, and the one who dreams of walking on Europe for the next ten years, defending champion Barça, beaten on Saturday in Wolfsburg 2-0 but qualified after their first leg festival (5-1). A nice revenge, too, three years after the 2019 final overflown by OL (4-1).
Lyon will travel to Italy with determination, confidence, and at least two certainties: it has never lost to Barça, and it has once again become the spearhead of French women’s football, ahead of PSG, ambitious but too feverish overall of the two games.
Paris will have bent, on the way out, on the blunders of its goalkeeper Barbora Votikova, finally out on the return injury. He gave in on Saturday against the head game of Hegerberg and Renard, clinical in front of the but on two assists from Selma Bacha (14th, 83rd), despite the equalization of Marie-Antoinette Katoto (62nd).
The Norwegian, top scorer in the history of the C1 (58 goals), even believed to double the bet (56th), but Melvine Malard, passer on the action, was offside with a breath.
Attendance record
Dropped in the standings behind OL, five points behind OL, PSG are heading straight for a frustrating season, even if the Coupe de France final against Yzeure (D2) is promised to them.
The future after the Kheira Hamraoui affair, absent from this double confrontation after an altercation in training last Saturday, will have polluted three of the four confrontations of the season against the Lyon rival, for three defeats…
OL have always stayed the course since August, except in the round of 16 of the Coupe de France (3-0 defeat against Paris). He takes his revenge on the quarter-final of C1 last year, won by PSG on away goals.
Amandine Henry’s partners certainly suffered, losing to Katoto on the hour mark, but they mostly resisted, thanks in particular to their goalkeeper Christiane Endler, who flew past Sara Däbritz (54th) and s is interposed in front of Sakina Karchaoui (76th).
The Chilean door, which left Paris for Lyon last summer, responded well to the insulting songs of the ultra supporters of the Auteuil bend, who came en masse for the occasion.
The latter ensured a warm atmosphere despite the defeat, giving the Parc des Princes an energy forgotten in recent weeks with the men’s section, much criticized by groups of supporters despite the Ligue 1 title.
The attendance was 43,254 spectators: never before had a stadium gathered so many people in France for a women’s club match.
But 40,000 people could not be enough on Saturday to block OL, which had once again become a big player in Europe.
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