Olympiacos’ European campaign has gotten off to a shaky start after falling short against Olympique Lyon in a hard-fought affair.
The Piraeus outfit suffered a 0-2 away loss against the French side on Friday morning (AEST) in the first matchday of the UEFA Europa League’s League Phase.
The match was delicately poised for much of the first hour with both teams producing chances but not finding the back of the net.
Lyon midfielder Rayan Cherki eventually broke the deadlock in the 65th minute as he found himself in the box and drilled a shot with venom into the goal.
The Piraeus giants nearly equalised in the 70th minute via a bicycle kick attempt from substitute Charalampos Kostoulas, though it just went over the bar.
The French club made them play just one minute later as playmaker Said Benrahma was played through by winger Wilfried Zaha and guided the ball into the bottom left (71′).
The “red-whites” nearly got one back in the 88th minute when a cross from winger Willian was headed accidentally by Lyon defender Duje Caleta-Car into his own net, though VAR found that Willian was offside when he first received the ball.
Olympiacos manager José Luis Mendilibar conceded that his side was the weaker of the two in the game, saying to media post-match:
“I think we did less than we all thought we could do today, even though we created three-four clear goalscoring opportunities that we unfortunately did not take to get back into the game,”
“Then we did not manage to defend effectively and overall, I think the opponent was better than us.”
The result caps off a poor display from Greece results wise in the Europa League, with PAOK having lost to Galatasaray the previous day.
