OM’s forward, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, has once again made history in the Europa League.
Thursday night, OM traveled to Benfica’s turf for the first leg of the Europa League quarter-final. The Marseille team was eager to end a streak of four consecutive defeats in all competitions and to achieve a good result ahead of the return leg at the Vélodrome next week.
Mission failed. Under the leadership of Jean-Louis Gasset, the players suffered a 2-1 defeat. Despite trailing by two goals at the 52nd minute mark following a strike by former Parisian Angel Di Maria, Marseille managed to reduce the deficit thanks to their inevitable Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Played through on the left by Moroccan Azzedine Ounahi, the 34-year-old striker beat the opposing goalkeeper by placing the ball to his left (67th minute).
Aubameyang Aims for the African Record
Scoring in the league last week, the Gabonese international (74 caps, 30 goals, but not called up since November) thus scored his 25th goal of the season in 42 appearances. In great form for several weeks, the former Saint-Etienne player took advantage to cement his legend.
Indeed, he becomes the first player to score 12 goals with a French club in a European campaign since Stéphane Guivarc’h in 1997-1998. The 1998 World Cup winner had scored 17 times with Auxerre between the Intertoto Cup and the UEFA Cup (now Europa League). He also surpasses Drogba and his 11 goals scored during the 2003/2004 European campaign with OM.
But that’s not all. Besides being the first player in 26 years to find the net 12 times with a French club in European competitions, PEA also becomes, with 10 goals, the top African scorer in a single C3 campaign. He surpasses Congolese Cédric Bakambu, stuck at 9 goals with Villarreal in 2015-2016.
His goal above all keeps OM alive ahead of the home leg next Thursday. An opportunity for the Laval native to achieve possible new records, as he is now just one goal away from Egyptian Mohamed Salah, the top African scorer in European competitions (57 goals for the Pharaoh against 56 for the Panther).
