A victory for Saint-Etienne against Montpellier saw les Stéphanois pull themselves up off the bottom of the league, leaving Lorient there instead as Lens came to town.
Christophe Pélissier made four changes to the team that lost to Nantes, bringing in Matthieu Dreyer, Vincent Le Goff, Bonke Innocent and Sambou Soumano for Paul Nardi, Jérôme Hergault, Enzo Le Fée and Laurent Abergel. Lorient lined up in a 4-3-3 shape.
Franck Haise also made four changes to the side that lost to Monaco, resting Przemyslaw Frankowski and Cheick Doucouré to give opportunities to Massadio Haïdara and Patrick Berg, while rotating out Wuilker Fariñez and Florian Sotoca too, with Jean-Louis Leca and Arnaud Kalimuendo returning. Lens set up in their usual 3-4-1-2 formation.
Lorient attempted to press Lens high up the pitch, with their front three each taking a centre-back and Thomas Monconduit and Quentin Boisgard pushing up to stick to Seko Fofana and Berg. This stopped Lens from being able to easily play through the centre, with Fofana and Berg having to drop back into defence to get on the ball.
Lens didn’t seem to be aiming to play through the centre anyway though. Their back three was unusually narrow in possession, rather than spreading out across the pitch to stretch Lorient’s frontline, meaning they didn’t have much space to work in, seeing them give the ball away cheaply a few times.
By narrowing the back three, Lens also narrowed Lorient’s frontline though, forcing Terem Moffi and Armand Laurienté inside with Jonathan Gradit and Facundo Medina. This pulled the wingers away from Jonathan Clauss and Haïdara, giving the wing-backs more space to use. If Lorient’s full-backs stepped out to meet the wing-backs, then Wesley Saïd or Kalimuendo would make runs in behind them, whereas if they held their positions, then the wing-backs had time and space to cross. Lorient’s full-backs did generally do a good job of getting out to Clauss and Haïdara quickly though, not giving them the time to turn and get away a good pass.
Unlike Lens, Lorient looked to spread out in possession, but it generally made for a lot of aimless slow passing, holding onto the ball but never really getting it into attack.
That was until they took the lead just before half-time. Lorient won back possession following a throw-in and fed the ball forward to Laurienté, who held onto the ball under heavy pressure from Berg and squirmed forward, passing both Berg and substitute Christopher Wooh, who was drawn forward towards Moffi. With Monconduit and Soumano bursting forward, Lorient were suddenly three-versus-three with Lens’ defence, and Laurienté crossed for Soumano to finish.
With the lead, Lorient started to sit back more to protect their lead, while Lens went on the attack. Haise introduced Sotoca at half-time as Saïd was injured, then switched to a 4-3-3 after a quarter of an hour as David Costa replaced Wooh and Doucouré returned in place of Berg.
While Laurienté would track back into midfield on the right, Moffi didn’t bother on the left, and so Lens spread the ball out to Clauss to isolate Le Goff.
Lorient doubled their lead on the counter. Laurienté won the ball then fed it through to substitute Stéphane Diarra outpacing Clauss as he ran into attack. Diarra’s deflected shot fell to new signing Ibrahima Koné, who had come on as a substitute less than a minute before, scoring with his first touch in a Lorient shirt.
It was enough to lift Lorient off the bottom of the league, embarrassing Lens.
If you enjoy these posts, please consider subscribing to our Patreon or making a one-off donation. For just €2.99, you can get access to premium videos and training sessions.
No responses yet