Leipzig battle for pride as Poulsen downs Sporting Lisbon

Leipzig played host to Sporting Lisbon this evening with mere pride to play for. Goals from Benjamin Sesko and Yusuf Poulsen sealed a 2-1 win.

It may be too late, but RB Leipzig bagged their first points of their Champions League campaign with victory over Sporting Lisbon this evening. The 8th-minute brought about the first significant chance of the game as Loïs Openda stung the palms of Franco Israel. Sporting also came close as Conrad Harder’s effort curled around the post. Leipzig constructed the lead in a beautiful manner midway through the half. Xavi Simons fed David Raum whose first-time cross was converted by Benjamin Sesko. 

Leipzig looked to double their lead on the half-hour when Raum rattled the net but a VAR check spotted Openda interfering with Fresneda in an offside position. Aside from a small period of domination for the Portuguese visitors, Leipzig controlled swathes of the action with Christoph Baumgartner and Xavi Simons impressive. 

After some pinball in the Sporting Lisbon box to start the second-half, Amadou Haidara managed to release a rasping strike which kissed off the post and away from danger. It wasn’t long before Willi Orbán faced a more difficult task as top-scorer Viktor Gyökeres was substituted in. With their Champions League fate already decided, Marco Rose also withdrew Raum, Simons and Openda with an eye on next weekend’s Bundesliga duties. 

Things got lively again in the final 15 minutes as Gyökeres restored parity after collecting a Daniel Braganca pass to skip past Orbán and pick out the top-left corner. However, said parity would last three minutes in total as Leipzig’s longest serving player Yusuf Poulsen bundled the ball past Israel. In a bid to salvage a point, Sporting threw caution to the wind and pressed for an equaliser but nothing arrived as Die Roten Bullen hung on.