Benfica beat Lech Poznań 3-1 as the bench took over

Benfica went into the night with a rotated side and still walked away with a 3-1 win over Lech Poznań. The telling part was not the shape of the starting XI, but the quality that came off the bench. Gianluca Prestianni scored shortly after coming on, and Georgiy Sudakov finished the game with a goal and an assist.

Prestianni's impact off the bench

Prestianni wore shirt number 25 and struck soon after entering the match, which gave Benfica the lift they had been missing for long stretches. A Bola's match report called him the kind of player who unlocks deadlocks, and that fits the night well enough. Benfica had control, but the game needed a sharper edge once Lech kept hanging around.

The result leaves Benfica with four matches and 12 points in the Europa League phase, a clean start even if the game itself was uneven. They are four from four in the competition so far, and the bench was the reason this one stayed comfortable in the end.

Sudakov finished the job

Sudakov's contribution was the more complete one. He scored Benfica's third in the 90th minute after combining with Enzo Barrenechea, and he ended the night as the match's standout performer. That late finish took away any doubt after Lech had made the scoreline awkward enough to matter.

Lech did have moments of resistance. Mateusz Lis made eight saves, and Leo Bengtsson came off the bench to score their only goal. Even so, Benfica carried the decisive quality, and this was another game where their depth showed more than their starting line-up did.