He FC Barcelona is a few days after playing his sixth final of the Champions League femenina In seven years, fifth consecutive, in pursuit of his fourth title of European champion. The Barca team will do it in the José Alvalade Stadium from Lisbon next Saturday, May 24 before the Arsenal English, executioner in semifinals of the most laureate club in history in the great continental competition, the Lyon Olympic. With eight titles harvested in 11 finals, the French team lavings a palmarés comfortably in which the second in trophies is the German Frankfurt Eintracht with 4, while Barça is third with 3. In spite competition power. ” Meanwhile, the OL does not resign to give prominence and announces an ambitious plan to maintain its referential status. “The OL is the best team in the history of women's football. It deserves specific resources. And, for that to happen, the women's club needs its own identity, without being secondary or being below the male team,” US owner told AFP, Michele kangwho presented a new logo with the intention of promoting a club that has its own stamp. We must not forget that the male ol, a historical one who before the irruption thanks to the Qatari money of the PSG as a French football dominator, came to link seven consecutive link titles.
Since 2022, the male ol went from his historic owner, Jean Michel Classroomsto the American John Textorbut the feeling of permanent crisis is there. With a negative balance of 505 million euros, it has to raise 100 if you do not want to be sanctioned with an administrative decrease imposed by the National Management Control Directorate.
With the will to claim the life of the female ol, its owner announces an ambitious plan that will result in strengthening a genuine identity.
The France champion will now play all his games at the Groupama stadium and change even his name to OL Lyonnes. “We are building this own identity for our female team in the context of the inheritance and family of Olympique Lyonnais, of which we will always be part,” he announced Michele kang. Ol's women's team became independent of OL after the American businesswoman bought the Women's Section from Eagle Football Group – previously Ol Group – on February 8, 2024. Kang directs a structure of several clubs, such as Washington Spirit and London City lionesses.
The most aspirational decision has to do with the will to take all its matches to the Great Stadium of the capital of Rhone, the Groupama de Décines-Charpieu stadium, on the outskirts of Lyon. Until now, they had already brought European matches to a large enclosure that has a capacity of 59,000 places, although the challenge is to find the public that fills so much tier or, at least, a good part of it. Barça's mobilizing example in the great matches that led to Camp Nou, with more than 90,000 spectators in two European games against Real Madrid and Wolfsburg, is a lighthouse for global women's football.
The Lyon training field stadium only has the capacity for 1,500 seats and is not appropriate for an OL ambition team. “We had to find a permanent home and right now is the Groupama stadium that is very large, without a doubt, but we have already reached 30,000 or 40,000 spectators, so it is not so unattainable,” he warned. “We can achieve it, no doubt, and we will achieve it,” he predicted. “It will take time, but for our great European or League games, our ambition will be to fill the stadium,” he added.
Finally, the OL Lyonnes will have at his disposal his campus in Meyzieu, not far from decines-chapieu, where the academy has been mixed since 2016, and where from now on the professional players and the women's training center will meet. “Our current training center is too small and inappropriate. It completely lacks space, equipment and capacity, and needs better and more modern equipment,” Kang said, “an avant -garde installation specifically designed for women” is a necessity, whose opening of this “first high -performance campus, entirely dedicated to women's football, is scheduled for 2026”.
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“We want to say that we are Ol Lyonnes and not Ol Lyons”:, Kang stressed, emphasizing the identity of the OL female team, which does not alone change its name but also of the logo. “We are facing a new beginning for our team,” said Michele Kang. “We need a separate identity of the male team, we are trying to develop a new identity,” he continued without losing the historical essence of the OL family, red and blue colors included. Kang launched a proclamation, a message loaded with the future: “The players have this desire to win, this positive energy, that is what has defined this team and what will define this team.” “Women deserve to play in the best stadium. We cannot develop an experience for fans if followers change their stadium for each game. We want to increase our fans. It is a great challenge to fill this stadium,” he concluded. It is clear that Barça and its great popular pull creates school.
