Angers continues its crazy comeback

Clément Pédron, Media365, published on Sunday January 19, 2025 at 7:34 p.m.

Winner of Auxerre on Sunday (2-0, 18th day), Angers offered itself a third victory in a row in L1. In the standings, the SCO is five points ahead of the red zone… like the AJA.

AJ Auxerre had not won in Ligue 1 since November 24, it was at home against… Angers. And precisely, the Burgundians were counting on this trip to Maine-et-Loire to stem an ugly series of four defeats and three draws in all competitions without any victory. It's a failure. At the end of the afternoon, Christophe Pélissier's team scuttled itself and conceded another defeat, the eighth of the season in the championship. With five points ahead of the red zone, AJA is making life more complicated, especially with regard to its upcoming games in Ligue 1. Faced with an Angevin team in good form (two victories in a row in the league), the Burgundians had the ball throughout the match without managing to do much with it. Goalkeeper Yahia Fofana can attest to this.

And conversely, the SCO opted for another approach. And he also managed to provoke destiny by opening the score after a quarter of an hour of play thanks to an own goal from Sinaly Diomandé, of whom we still wonder what he wanted to do with this resumption of the header from a corner (1-0, 17th). And the least we can say is that Auxerre has persevered in this path of bad luck or regular scuttling. The Burgundians were reduced to ten four minutes later after the exclusion of Osho for a foul from outside the area but as the last defender on Lepaul.

LePaul, X factor

Tackled by the opposing defender before being able to try his luck in the first half, Esteban Lepaul quickly got his head back on track by doubling the lead barely two minutes after the restart by taking a superb ball from Hanin which we will highlight the very good performance (2-0, 47th). Despite this second blow to the head, the AJA continued to put their heart into the work but not always at the right pace or with the right technical accuracy to hope for anything. And it was even the SCO who, during added time, had the ball for 3-0 but Bamba Dieng crossed his shot slightly too much. With this result, Alexandre Dujeux's team still gives itself some air in the standings and can thank Esteban Lepaul, in the oven and in the mill in this match. In the closet at the start of the season, the striker has now scored five goals in the last six matches in all competitions and is leading the SCO's comeback operation.