Lyon completed a memorable first league-cup double on Saturday when they beat Paris Saint Germain 1-0 in the French Cup final to add to their seventh successive championship.
Lyon’s fourth French Cup, coming after wins in 1964, 1967 and 1973, was fittingly secured by Sidney Govou who scored the extra-time winner.
Govou, goalkeeper Gregory Coupet and Brazilian playmaker Juninho are the only three players who have featured in all of Lyon’s seven league title campaigns.
PSG, who won the League Cup this season but only narrowly avoided relegation, were unlucky not to have settled the tie in normal time, hitting the woodwork on two occasions.
VETERAN
Zoumana Camara saw a 10th-minute attempt come off the post before veteran striker Pedro Pauleta, probably playing his last match for the club, thought he had scored with a left-foot drive on the half-hour mark only to see Anthony Reveillere clear the ball off the line.
In first half injury time, defender Sylvain Armand headed the ball from a Jerome Rothen free-kick into the net past Coupet only for the effort to be ruled out for offside.
PSG’s luck continued to desert them on the hour mark when Coupet made another important save from Mario Yepes before Kim Kallstrom cleared off the line, via the crossbar, as Camara followed up.
SAVE
Substitute Bernard Mendy then thought he had won the final for PSG in the fourth minute of injury time at the end of the game only to see his close-range drive superbly saved by the in-form Coupet.
Lyon had gone into the match under a cloud after veteran defender Patrick Muller had left the squad without permission on Friday to join up with the Swiss national team to prepare for Euro 2008.
Muller had been warned his place in the squad was at risk if he didn’t prove his fitness. The champions were second-best in most departments of the final.
French international striker Karim Benzema almost scored in the first half after a sweet one-two with Brazilian teammate Fred only for his sharp drive to miss the target.
Substitute Mathieu Bodmer then saw his header midway through the second half cleared off the line by Yepes with keeper Jerome Alonzo well beaten.
Lyon made PSG pay for their misses when Govou scored in the 103rd minute. A cross from Benzema confounded the PSG defence and Govou was the more alert to the ball and fired in from an acute angle past Alonzo.
Shohei Ohtani and his wife arrived in South Korea with his Los Angeles Dodgers teammates yesterday ahead of their season-opening games with the San Diego Padres next week. Ohtani, wearing a black training suit and a cap backwards, was the first Dodgers player who showed up at the arrival gate of Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. His wife, Mamiko Tanaka, walked several steps behind him. As a crowd of fans, many wearing Dodgers jerseys, shouted his name and cheered slogans, Ohtani briefly waved his hand, but did not say anything before he entered a limousine bus with his wife. Fans held placards
Taiwan’s Tai Tzu-ying yesterday advanced to the quarter-finals at the All England Open, beating Kim Ga-eun of South Korea 21-17, 21-15. With the win, Tai earned a semi-final against China’s He Bingjiao, who beat Michelle Li of Canada 21-9, 21-9. Defending champion An Se-young defeated India’s P.V. Sindhu 21-19, 21-11. An on Wednesday cruised into the second round, unlike last year’s men’s winner, Li Shifeng, who suffered a shock defeat. South Korea’s An, the world No. 1, overcame Taiwan’s Hsu Wen-chi 21-17, 21-16 to set up the match against Sindhu. In other women’s singles matches, Taiwan’s Sung Shuo-yun lost 21-18, 24-22 against Carolina Marin of
EYEING TOP SPOT: A victory in today’s final against Storm Hunter and Katerina Siniakova would return 38-year-old Hsieh Su-wei to the world No. 1 ranking Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens on Thursday secured a spot in the women’s doubles finals at the BNP Paribas Open after dispatching Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) at Indian Wells. Hsieh and her Belgian partner Mertens, who won the Australian Open in late January, coasted through the first set after breaking their opponents’ serve twice, but found the going tougher in the second. Both pairs could only muster one break point over 12 games, neither of which were converted, leaving the set to be decided by a tiebreaker. Hsieh and Mertens took a 6-3 lead,
DOUBLES PAYBACK: Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Martens avenged their defeat in the quarters at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open against Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei on Wednesday advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, California. Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium dispatched Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani 6-1, 6-4 to set up a clash against Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez for a spot in the final of the WTA 1000 tournament. Hsieh and Martens made a blistering start to their rematch after they lost to Schuurs and Stefani in the quarter-finals at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open last month, winning three games without reply at the start of the first set