Rafael Pereira da Silva is one half of a pair of Brazilian twins who joined Manchester United aged just seventeen in January 2008. He and his twin brother Fabio had been on the books of Rio de Janeiro based club Fluminense since they were eleven years old, but had yet to represent the first team. […]
Tag: Defender
Warmed Omari – Player Profile
Warmed Omari is a centre-back who joined Olympique Lyonnais on a season-long loan from Rennes in August 2024. He was brought in on the final day of the transfer window to provide defensive cover in the wake of the departures of Mamadou Sarr, Sinaly Diomandé, Adryelson and Dejan Lovren, which left the squad depleted in […]
Abner Vinícius – Player Profile
Abner Vinícius is a Brazilian left-back who joined Olympique Lyonnais from Real Betis in July 2024. He signed on a five year contract and cost the French club €8 million, with Betis entitled to twenty per cent of the fee if Lyon ever sell him on. To give him his full name, Abner Vinícius da […]
Moussa Niakhaté – Player Profile
Moussa Niakhaté is a tall and imposing left-footed centre-back who signed for Lyon from Nottingham Forest for €31.9 million in July 2024. He was ostensibly brough in to replace Jake O’Brien, who was sold to Everton at around the same time. Niakhaté was born into a family of Senegalese origin living near Lille in the […]
Adryelson – Player Profile
Adryelson is a Brazilian centre-back who signed for Olympique Lyonnais from Botafogo for €3.58m in the January 2024 transfer window, aged twenty-five. He’s the second player to make the move from Botafogo to Lyon since the clubs have both been part of American businessman John Textor’s multi-club ownership project. He’ll hope to make a bigger […]
Mamadou Sarr – Player Profile
Mamadou Sarr is a central defender who made his debut for the Lyon first team in their final home match of the 2022-23 season. He came off the bench to replace Maxence Caqueret in the 83rd minute of a 3-0 win against Stade de Reims. Sarr is a product of Lyon’s famed youth academy. He […]
Duje Caleta-Car – Player Profile
Duje Ćaleta-Car joined Lyon from Southampton on a season-long loan in August 2023 following the English club’s relegation from the Premier League. Lyon paid a loan fee of €1.54 million to secure the Croatian international centre-back’s services for the year. Lyon were desperately in need of reinforcements in that department following the sale of Castello […]
Jake O’Brien – Player Profile
Born in Cork in 2001, Jake O’Brien is a centre-back who represents the Republic of Ireland national team at Under-21 level and currently plies his trade at Olympique Lyonnais in Ligue 1 in France. He is notable for being one of the first players to have his career trajectory significantly shaped by American businessman John […]
Dejan Lovren – Player Profile
Croatian centre-back Dejan Lovren is one of four players in the current Lyon squad to have recently returned to the club for a second spell. (The other three being Alexandre Lacazette, Corentin Tolisso and Rémy Riou). Lovren re-joined Lyon in January 2023 for a fee of €2 million from Zenit St Petersburg, having previously worn the […]
Saël Kumbedi – Player Profile
When Lyon signed the seventeen year old prospect Saël Kumbedi from Le Havre for €1 million in the summer of 2022, he was very much seen as one for the future. At the time, he only had 219 minutes of first team action in Ligue 2 to his name. However, the young right-back made such […]