AS Monaco returned to the summit of Ligue 1 on Friday night, coming from behind to beat RC Lens 2-1 at Stade Louis-II on Friday, September 18 in a tense, back-and-forth clash that extended the Rouge et Blanc’s unbeaten start to the season.
Monaco went into the match aiming to continue an unbeaten run across all competitions, five wins and a draw, against a Lens side who had recently changed coach and had won four of their previous six trips to the Principality. Head coach Filipe Luís said before the match that the coaching change wouldn’t significantly alter his preparation, given how clearly defined Lens’s style of play remained, describing the visitors as an aggressive, vertical side dangerous in transition, with quick players capable of flooding the box.
Luís set his side up in a 4-4-2 formation, largely unchanged from recent matches, with Matthis Abline and Edan Diop both handed starts, the latter making his first appearance of the season after coming through the club’s academy.
The match opened at a rapid tempo, with Lens testing goalkeeper Lukáš Hradecký inside the first three minutes, before Monaco responded through Abline, who saw an early volley from a corner fly wide before having a goal ruled out for offside just minutes later. Diop also had an effort disallowed for an earlier offside in the build-up before the half-hour mark, before Monaco’s pressure finally told: Abline turned provider, teeing up Paris Brunner to open the scoring in the 33rd minute, the German forward’s fourth Ligue 1 goal of the season and Abline’s first assist for the club. The pair combined again moments later, only for Lens goalkeeper Robin Risser to deny Brunner from close range, with Risser also called into action to save efforts from Denis Zakaria and a resurgent Abline before the break. Monaco led 1-0 at half-time.
The second half opened just as sharply, with Nazinho again setting up Abline, who found the net for a third time, only to see the goal ruled out for offside once more. Lens made Monaco pay for the missed opportunities soon after, equalising through a Udol header from a corner in the 57th minute, a goal that visibly lifted the visitors, who came close to taking the lead themselves through Hazard and Thauvin in the following minutes.
Hradecký produced a crucial save to deny a curling effort from Lens’s number 9 in the 74th minute, keeping Monaco level at a pivotal moment. The decisive break came in the 84th minute, when a driven Vanderson cross was turned into his own net by Lens defender Gradit, restoring Monaco’s lead. The Rouge et Blanc held on through the closing stages, surviving late efforts from Édouard and Udol, while missing further chances of their own through Brunner and Folarin Balogun, to seal the 2-1 win.
The victory sends Monaco provisionally back to the top of the Ligue 1 table heading into the international break. The result also puts Brunner in select company: he becomes only the third Monaco player in the past decade to score four goals within the first five matches of a Ligue 1 season, following Radamel Falcao in 2017-18 and Wissam Ben Yedder in 2023-24.