Bordeaux kept a clean sheet for the first time this season despite being reduced to ten men after 35 minutes as they battled to a goalless draw at Ligue 1 Uber Eats champions Lille on Saturday.
THE MATCH
With Jonathan David having only returned from helping Canada qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup on Thursday, Lille's leading scorer started on the bench, but the hosts still must have thought they would have sufficient firepower to see off a Bordeaux side bottom of the table and winless in 13 league outings away from home.
Lille, by contrast, were unbeaten in six and had won their last five against Bordeaux, so Jocelyn Gourvennec's men were odds-on to give their ambitions — and goal difference — a serious shot in the arm.
Those pre-match predictions looked confirmed when Jonathan Bamba tested Gaëtan Poussin after just three minutes with Amadou Onana sending the follow-up wide (3'). Lille failed to build on that momentum, but were given a boost when Enock Kwateng was dismissed for a second bookable offence with ten minutes still left to play in the first half (35').
When you're struggling as badly as Bordeaux, luck usually abandons you, but fortune favoured David Guion's men early in the second half when Bamba struck a post (51') before Lady Luck then turned really nasty with the reigning French champions.
Onana (61'), Tjago Djalo (63') and Onana again (90+1') saw goals ruled out by VAR, all for offside, as Lille toiled. Bamba forced another save from Poussin (70') ) — preferred once again to Benoît Costil — while former Bordeaux man Hatem ben Arfa also tested the Bordeaux 'keeper shortly after coming off the bench (79'), but the hosts were unable to find a way through.
THE PLAYER: Gaëtan Poussin
The 23-year-old started the season as back-up to Costil and had to wait until 23 January and the win over Strasbourg to get his first appearance of the season. Since, he has not seen his side triumph, but he helped them avoid defeat at the Stade Pierre Mauroy, and earned his second Ligue 1 Uber Eats career clean sheet.
THE STAT: 30
Bordeaux had conceded 70 times in their opening 29 league games, but avoided edging closer to the league record of conceding a goal in successive games from the start of a top-flight season held by Toulon since 1959/60 (31) by keeping a clean sheet in their 30th outing of 2021/22.
