Liverpool 1 – 2 Lyon: Super Subs Save the Day

By: Inara | October 21st, 2009

Since so much has been said about yesterday’s game, I’m not going to go too much into it. I just wanted to say how proud I am of my team. We’ve been waiting for this win for a long time. It might just be the group stages, but the biggest criticism of Lyon has been that they’ve been unable to defeat a big team away from home. Draw, yes, but not win.

Britain Soccer Champions League

Pure Joy.

People might say, “Oh but Liverpool didn’t have their two star players,” but then Lyon didn’t have any central defenders. So I’d call that an even handicap. Liverpool are one of the biggest teams in the world, so I don’t buy their weak bench as an excuse when theoretically, ours ought to be weaker than theirs (though that is arguably not the case). At any rate, what it boiled down to was this: Lyon played for the full 93 minutes, and Liverpool didn’t.

The match itself was fairly even. I don’t think one side outplayed the other, as both Liverpool and Lyon went through phases of domination. There could have been a lot more goals for the two teams, but both goalkeepers were on top of things. Both squads also lost an important player to injury in the first half – Steven Gerrard and Cris. For those of you who don’t know, Cris decided to tackle Dirk Kuyt’s knee with his head and had to be taken out because they feared he had had a concussion.

Puel replaced Cris with youth player Maxime Gonalons. With Jeremy Toulalan already playing as a CB, Gonalons, a DM by trade, was forced into playing a strange position for his CL debut. But he responded well to the pressure and scored the first goal.

I might not have agreed with Puel’s starting XI (Ederson, really?), but his choice of subs was inspired. Bafetimbi Gomis might not have scored, but he and Lisandro wore down a tired Liverpool defense and made Cesar Delgado’s last gasp goal possible.

SOCCER-CHAMPIONS/

WTF were you thinking, Cris?

Other positives: Hugo Lloris was awesome! I’ll be remembering that save from Fabio Aurelio’s header for a long time. Sidney Govou had Emiliano Insúa in his back pocket for the entire match, and it was his cross that led to Delgado’s goal. Kim Kallstrom once again put in a steady performance, as did Toulalan and Lisandro. The fullbacks were decent though I’ve definitely seen them do better. Jean II Makoun looked a bit lost at times, and did Ederson.

But the biggest shout out has to go to the fans who traveled all the way to England. It was amazing to hear their chants drown out those of the Liverpool supporters, especially those after the first OL goal. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought that the game was taking place at the Stade de Gerland!

All in all, it was a solid game and a fully deserved victory. Right now, Lyon top their group with nine points out of a possible nine. There are still three games remaining, two of which are at home. Lyon have 90% qualified for the knockout rounds and are favorites to top their group.

Some highlights:

Liverpool – Lyon Résumé du match