Although a rerun of the final match of these teams’ seasons in May, albeit at the Stade Louis II, only four Monaco players that started that match lined up for this one.
With a Champions League qualifier to play in mid-week, it was all changes for Monaco in the league as they hope to recover from their loss to Shakhtar Donetsk. Wissam Ben Yedder, Aleksandr Golovin, Aurélien Tchouaméni and Caio Henrique were the only men to continue as Niko Kovac set them up in a 4-2-3-1 formation.
On the other hand, Franck Haise made only one personnel change to the team that drew with Saint-Etienne, replacing teenager Christopher Wooh with Kevin Danso at the heart of the Lensois defence. They switched from their usual 3-4-1-2 shape to a 3-5-2 though, with Gaël Kakuta moving back into midfield.
This change of shape saw Lens line up better defensively against Monaco. Florian Sotoca and Ignatius Ganago would pressure the centre-backs, with Sotoca in particular curving his runs to block the pass out to Caio at left-back, while Seko Fofana and Kakuta would push up to get tight to Jean Lucas and Tchouaméni and Jonathan Clauss and Deiver Machado would move out to close down Monaco’s full-backs.
This made it difficult for Monaco to play out from the back, often forcing them long, however Lens were struggling to pose much of a threat too.
Shortly into the second half, Lens took the lead though. Ganago chased after a pass in behind, which looked easily covered by Strahinja Pavlovic, only for the Serbian to miss his challenge and put Ganago one-on-one with the goalkeeper. The Cameroonian had to get his shot away from a tight angle that Alexander Nübel should have had easily covered, but the German allowed it through to squeak over the line.
Lens went a man down not long after though, with Cheick Doucouré sent off for a foul on Krépin Diatta.
Kovac made a triple substitution to get back into the game, removing Diatta, Ben Yedder and Tchouaméni for Gelson Martins, Kevin Volland and Myron Boadu, seeing Golovin move inside into the midfield. Haise also made a change, bringing on Yannick Cahuzac for Ganago to shore up the midfield, as Lens sat back to defend their lead in a 5-3-1 shape.
As the pressure mounted, Haise made a further double substitution to protect Lens defensively. Off went Sotoca and Kakuta for Simon Banza and Massadio Haïdara. This freshened up the attack, with Banza happy to run, but also allowed Przemyslaw Frankowski, who had replaced Machado at the start of the half, to move from wing-back into midfield, with Haïdara a more natural fit on the left.
Numerical parity was restored when Golovin was sent off for a challenge on Banza as he tried to recover a bouncing ball, but this didn’t affect the momentum of the game: Monaco were still in need of a goal and Lens were happy to sit back and protect their lead.
Lens doubled their lead at the end of injury time when Caio took a poor touch and fell over, handing the ball to Frankowski to push forward and square to Banza to finish.
It was a match high on drama but low on quality that gave Lens their first win of the season. Both teams struggled to muster much in possession until Monaco essentially handed Lens the lead and, after that, the Northern side were happy to simply shut up shop. A loss with a weakened side must have been seen as a worthwhile risk for Monaco given the potential boon of Champions League football, however it leaves them with just one point from three matches so far.
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