The conditions that led to Lyon’s two costly mistakes were created by Arsenal’s intense pressing.<\/p>\n
Lyon goalkeeper Christiane Endler should have collected Mariona Caldentey’s free-kick as it bobbled towards her, but the presence of Blackstenius put her off and she fumbled the ball backwards.<\/p>\n
Seven minutes before time, Ingrid Engen let a pass roll past her, lost a foot race with Smith, and collided with Endler to give Smith an open goal.<\/p>\n
However, they were still the kind of errors you would not expect a vastly experienced goalkeeper and a two-time Champions League-winning defender to make.<\/p>\n
During her post-match news conference, Slegers did not entertain the idea that her side’s goals were fortunate.<\/p>\n
“The first goal, it’s hard for the goalkeeper because the ball goes in front and there are runners so it’s hard to see. I think it caught the opposition off guard a bit,” Slegers said.<\/p>\n
“The second goal is a good moment that we wanted to create. Sometimes you score the most brilliant goals – but you score all sort of goals in football.”<\/p>\n
The Caldentey free-kick that Endler misjudged and was bundled into her own net by Engen was one of several low Arsenal set-piece deliveries aimed to cause maximum disruption. <\/p>\n
It was clearly a rehearsed training ground ploy, although Slegers gave little away.<\/p>\n
“Lyon is extreme with their physical power and height, so you always look at what we have, what the opposition has, and what the opportunities are for us,” she said.<\/p>\n
They were the kind of moments that go your way when things are going well and everything is beginning to click – as was Lyon’s Kadidiatou Diani hitting the crossbar when played through on goal with the score 1-1.<\/p>\n
“I thought the momentum we came out of the second half with was massive and hopefully we can take it into the next few games,” striker Alessia Russo said. <\/p>\n
“Football is about fine margins, sometimes things go your way, sometimes they don’t – it doesn’t matter how you score.”<\/p>\n
In football, as in life, you make your own luck – and Arsenal’s season could be set for a thrilling conclusion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The conditions that led to Lyon’s two costly mistakes were created by Arsenal’s intense pressing. Lyon goalkeeper Christiane…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":632663,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-632662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=632662"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/632662\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/632663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=632662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=632662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=632662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}