• OL will try to conquer, this Saturday (7 p.m.) in Turin, the eighth Champions League in its history, against FC Barcelona.

  • After a season without the slightest trophy, the Lyon club has the possibility of signing a double, with a D1 championship almost in its pocket two days from the end.

  • And this despite a black series of major injuries, again this season, starting with Amel Majri and Dzsenifer Marozsan (knee), who had been decisive in the previous European final against Barça (4-1), in May 2019 in Budapest. (Hungary).

Amandine Henry in central defense, Griedge Mbock on the right side and Eugénie Le Sommer in the middle.

If we had slipped to Sonia Bompastor last summer that she should chain so many oddities this season, she probably would not have imagined being in a position to achieve a Champions League-Championship double.

The title in D1 is however almost in the pocket, with five points ahead of PSG with two days remaining, and OL will try to conquer their eighth European title, this Saturday (7 p.m.) in Turin, in the final against FC Barcelona.

The Lyon coach hoped to have a full squad for the resumption in August 2021, and above all to immediately recover two major players, Griedge Mbock and Ada Hegerberg, then seriously injured for more than a year.

These two indisputable starters finally returned to the squad little by little, and respectively played again from the end of September and the beginning of October.

In the wake of this double good news, Amel Majri took over in the infirmary with a rupture of the cruciate ligaments of the left knee in October, synonymous with an almost white season.

Five players have been absent for a long time this season at OL

Then will be linked among the serious physical glitches, namely resulting in more than two months of absence, Damaris Egurrola (left ankle), Danielle van de Donk (right leg), Christiane Endler (right knee), and finally Dzsenifer Marozsan, victim at the beginning of May of a rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament of the right knee.

A black series to which we must add shorter packages for Wendie Renard (thigh), Selma Bacha (quadriceps) and Catarina Macario (muscle injury), as well as gastroenteritis which deprived Ada Hegerberg of a perilous quarter-final first leg Champions League in Turin (2-1).

And in the new pink notebook section, we find Sara Björk Gunnarsdottir's maternity leave, only to return to competition in March.

Do not throw away any more, Sonia Bompastor notably had to go through the winter with a decimated environment.

How could OL in this context avoid losing everything as was the case last season without Mbock and Hegerberg, then with a cluster of fatal Covid-19 before the European quarter-final second leg against PSG? (1-2)?

“Our season shows the mental strength of the team”

"The credit really goes to the players," says former Lyon midfielder Camille Abily, now assistant to Sonia Bompastor.

When I see how some of them have agreed to sacrifice themselves to a position that was not theirs to help the team, like Griedge Mbock who played side and midfield… ”Because this makeshift tinkering did not prevent OL from achieving their two main objectives of the season (D1-C1), even if they were shattered in the round of 16 of the Coupe de France in Paris (3-0), with a improbable medium composed of Selma Bacha and Griedge Mbock.

“We are not going to go so far as to speak of a curse but it is certain that we have not been spared injuries for three years, notes Delphine Cascarino.

Our season shows the mental strength of the team.

Returning just like Sarah Bouhaddi and Dzsenifer Marozsan in January from her loan to OL Reign (United States) – another difficulty to manage for Sonia Bompastor –, Eugénie Le Sommer is going in the same direction.

We still managed to deal with a lot of injuries, and to win games when we were missing several players.

These are times when you have to know how to keep your back, work together and maintain trust.

That's what we managed to do and it can help us for this final against Barça.

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“We are moving forward for this reconquest without looking at all the glitches”

Sonia Bompastor played a major role in the dimension of trust, as Selma Bacha confides: “The coach gives us positive vibes.

When we lost Amel Majri to injury, we were sad for her but Sonia didn't want it to affect us.

“A successful bet in view of this D1 season, with 19 wins and 1 draw in 20 days, and traps overcome in the Champions League (Levante, Juventus and PSG).

“We said to ourselves at the start of the season that we had to recover what belongs to us, says young striker Melvine Malard.

In the head, we advance for this reconquest without taking into account all these glitches.

We feel strong mentally and physically, and we also play for all those absent girls.

Each in turn for Lyon, since Dzsenifer Marozsan and Amel Majri had respectively signed a goal and an assist in the previous OL-Barca (4-1), in the 2019 Champions League final in Budapest.

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