The curtain will soon close on the Coupe de la Ligue and Olympique Lyonnais will be there for the final on April 4. For the very latest edition of this competition, launched in 1995, the Lyonnais won their ticket to the Stade de France with a difficult elimination at home Lille on penalties (4-3), Tuesday January 21, after being joined to the score at the last second of regulation time (2-2).
The Lyonnais can thank their Romanian goalkeeper Ciprian Tatarusanu. Anthony Lopes' usual lineup, who arrived this summer from Nantes at OL but has only played this race this season, was the hero of the evening. It was he who diverted Jonathan Bamba's attempt during the series of shots on goal from the start and he had already saved his team at the end of the game on a good aerial exit in front of Victor Oshimen (77th). For the rest, Moussa Dembélé, Martin Terrier, Maxwel Cornet and Thiago Mendes all succeeded, Sanches also missing out on his side in Lille.
However, before reaching this point, Aouar, who had not delivered a great performance until then, thought he had done the hard part by giving the advantage to his team. After having managed to escape Benjamin André to infiltrate the northern defense, he fired a floating right shot that cheated goalkeeper Leonardo Jardim (2-1, 85th).
But this is without taking into account the decision of referee Benoît Millot to award a penalty for a fault by Rafael on Bamba which allowed Loïc Rémy, a former member of the Lyon house since trained at OL, to equalize ( 2-2).
OL racing on four boards
At the start of the game, Lille's Renato Sanches opened the scoring with a left shot after an action led by Oshimen and Jonathan Ikoné (13th) before Moussa Dembélé equalized on a penalty awarded for a foul by Gabriel's hand confirmed by video (1-1, 15th).
OL, 7th in Ligue 1, therefore confirms its good start to 2020 during which it remains, for the moment, unbeaten, and it therefore remains in the race on all four tables (championship, French and League cups and Champions League, like Paris-SG).
The Lyonnais thus find the Stade de France six years after their last final, in the Coupe de la Ligue already, which they had lost to Paris-Saint-Germain (2-1). They could find PSG, which plays Wednesday in Reims.
Despite five finals, Lyon only won the League Cup once: in 2001 with Jacques Santini on the bench. It was the trophy that launched the great period of domination over French football by Olympique Lyonnais, which subsequently won the Ligue 1 championship seven seasons in a row.
