Real Sociedad vs Lyon August 28, 2013

Don't expect to see Olympique Lyonnais in the Champions League group stage this season. They were thoroughly outplayed at home by Real Sociedad, who scored a pair of incredible goals en route to a 2-0 win over the French giants. Lyon were surprisingly on the back foot from the beginning of the match, with the visitors' superiority obvious early and often. Carlos Vela had Sociedad's first big chance of the night in the 12th minute, when he hit the post from the edge of the penalty area. Not long afterwards, Antoine Griezmann found the opener, and he did it in spectacular fashion.

  Watch: Griezmann's scissor kick Seferović's stunner from 35 yards Vela set up the goal with a cross toward the back post, around 12 yards from goal, but the goal was all about the finish. Griezmann jumped up to hit a volley, his foot level with his head, and powered a scissor kick into the back of the net.

Real Sociedad host Olympique Lyon in the second-leg of this Champions League qualifier, with the Spanish outfit having one foot in the competition after a 0-2 win back in France.

It’s been an impressive 12 months for the La Liga side, after finishing fourth in the league ahead of more favoured teams such as Valencia and Malaga in 2012/13.

The club did lose talented young midfielder Asier Illarramendi to Real Madrid over the summer, but stunning goals from Antoine Griezmann and Haris Seferovic sees Sociedad coping just fine without the Spaniard.

The side haven’t reached this competition since 2003 and with Lyon being shown as a shell of the side they once were, Sociedad look set to be in Thursday’s draw for the Champions League group stage.

Lyon have been overshadowed in Ligue 1 with the spending power of Paris Saint-Germain and with AS Monaco now operating in a similar vein, it could be a struggle this year for the club to even make the qualification spots.

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