Coming into this game on the back of four losses back-to-back, it’s fair to say Angers aren’t in the best of form.
Gérald Baticle made two changes to the side that lost to Nice, replacing Romain Thomas and Jimmy Cabot with Mathias Pereira Lage and Thomas Mangani. Angers set up in a 3-5-2 shape.
Franck Haise also made two changes to the team that drew with Lyon, bringing back Jean-Louis Leca and Jonathan Gradit at the expense of Wuilker Fariñez and Christopher Wooh. Rather than reverting back to their usual 3-4-1-2 or 3-4-3 formation, Lens continued with the 3-5-1-1 only otherwise seen against Lyon with attacker Florian Sotoca in midfield.
Both teams did some pressing early on, or when a team hit some specific trigger like a pass back to the goalkeeper. This was noticeable on Lens’ side for the movements of Sotoca: intially he would stick to Nabil Bentaleb, but he would often step up to pressure Enzo Jacques Rodolphe Ebosse. Rather than leaving this gap open in midfield, Gaël Kakuta would drop back into midfield to plug the hole.
Generally though both teams dropped off into 5-3-2 shapes to defend. It made for a dull first half, with both teams cancelling each other out and few chances.
Lens were perhaps the better side, with Gradit’s willingness to push forward on the ball forcing Angers’ forwards to come across, opening some space elsewhere, while Cheick Doucouré’s comfort in tight spaces allowed him to turn out and play into attack. However, with both teams having half their team in the backline, then sticking three men in front of them, there wasn’t much space for the attackers to carve out opportunities.
Angers ended up taking the lead very early in the second half. Sofiane Boufal tricked Facundo Medina into stepping out to meet him before allowing the ball to roll across him, meaning Doucouré was forced into coming across to stop him, but Boufal was able to keep the ball despite the Malian’s attempted tackle. With Doucouré drawn across, Angelo Fulgini was now left free on the edge of the area, so Boufal laid off the ball to him to rifle past Leca from outside the box.
Going behind shook Lens awake, seeing them look to consistently press Angers higher up the pitch. He would still drop back into midfield, but this saw Sotoca spend more time up in attack than in the first half.
Finally on their way to a win, Angers decided to instead shoot themselves in the foot. Mohamed-Ali Cho received a second yellow card for diving directly in front of the referee, seeing Angers reduced to ten men. Angers reacted by dropping back even deeper in a 5-3-1 shape to protect their lead.
Lens would equalise with barely any input from themselves. They spread the ball wide to Jonathan Clauss, whose cross went directly to Danijel Petkovic, yet, staring into the sun, the goalkeeper failed to claim it, falling at his feet. Petkovic went to grab the loose ball, but Ismaël Traoré got to it first, trying to clear it only to bounce it straight off of Batista Mendy into his own net.
Lens then repeated the trick seven minutes later. Clauss again received the ball down the right and, with Gradit overlapping, had the space to attempt a shot, lobbing Petkovic. It was perhaps another attempted cross that simply went awry, but with Petkovic again staring into the sun, he was unable to deal with it as it sailed over his head.
It wasn’t a very impressive performance from either side. They cancelled each other out in the first half, Angers took the lead from a throw-in, then folded in comedic circumstances as soon as Lens exerted any pressure on them.
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