Champions League: Lille at the foot of the wall after defeat in Salzburg

Lille falls back into its failings. Despite a promising draw on September 14, against Wolfsburg (0-0) and two consecutive victories in Ligue 1, the Northerners did not manage to chain, and they conceded defeat (1-2), Wednesday, September 29 , on the lawn of the Red Bull Arena in Salzburg, Austria.

Yet firmly in place, the reigning French champions made a good start to the match, leaving little space for their opponent. But faced with the ardor and youth of the team coached by Matthias Jaissle, the Mastiffs suffered the law of penalties, dear to the Austrian club.

On the first day of Group G of the Champions League, against Sevilla, Salzburg had obtained three shots on goal – for two misses – all caused by their young striker Karim Adeyemi. And the young German international has reoffended against LOSC.

After a loss of Lille ball on the edge of the Austrian area, Adeyemi was thrown in the back of the northerner defense before being unbalanced in the area by a tackle from Sven Botman. After consulting the VAR (video refereeing), the penalty was awarded, allowing the German prodigy to open the scoring.

Jocelyn Gourvennec’s players did not go far from the correctional, twice, before the break. A first time on a header from Rasmus Kristensen on the post (41^e), then on a strike from Adeyemi just before half-time, deflected by the skull of defender José Fonte who threw himself in front of his goal.

A case of penalties

Upon returning from the locker room, the LOSC found itself in great difficulty. On a free kick from Maximilian Wöber, Burak Yilmaz deflects the ball with his arm and concedes a new penalty, again transformed by Karim Adeyemi (53^e).

Jocelyn Gourvennec, the Lille coach, then made a triple change to wake up his team: Jonathan Ikoné, Jonathan Bamba and Amadou Onana replaced Angel Gomes, Timothy Weah and Xeka (60^e). In the process, Burak Yilmaz made up for it by relaunching the Mastiffs on a free kick … thanks to a blunder from Philipp Köhn, who totally missed his intervention (1-2, 63^e).

Galvanized by this unexpected goal, Lille tries to pack the meeting with the freshness of the entrants and begins to raise doubts about Salzburg, like a nice rush from Jonathan David punctuated by a crushed shot, while Ikoné was alone. on his right (68^e).

But the breath quickly subsided and the Austrians, very solid, achieved a logical success and took the lead of group G with 4 points, ahead of Seville (2), Wolfsburg (2) and Lille (1). The Mastiffs are still chasing their first success in the competition since November 2012 and they will have to revive against Sevilla on October 20.