The French champion thus continues a third consecutive success, after his double victories in front of two major teams of the circuit, Panathinaikos and CSKA Moscow.

Without his interior Yousoupha Fall, who became a dad during the week, Asvel was ahead at the break (39-36), flamboyant at first at the start, based on an 8-0 100% orchestrated by Jones, then at the end, when she played "small ball" with a precious Lighty.

In the meantime, the Tatar formation had shown itself faithful to its reputation as the best ball thief in the competition, also stretching wonderfully the defense of the champion of France to better punish it, like John Brown or Toni Jekiri ( 27-32, 15th), former local pivot.

Villeurbanne continued his momentum in the 3rd quarter, with Okobo in NBA mode, although penalized by his three faults but called back to the game after Diot's injury.

The Astroballe got carried away as the gap widened (62-51, 25), but a drop in skill and an obvious lack of an internal solution gradually left Kazan and the excellent Croatian winger Hezonja to hope (73-70 ).

But Okobo, top scorer in the Euroleague and author of 35 points in Greece during the 7th day, Jones and Lighty then scored all the points of the Rhone team in the money-time.

© 2021 AFP