Universe of France. Among the most fervent supporters with historic players that have come through there and amazing city
Erm... sorry, but having great supporters doesn't mean you have great history as a club.
Which "historic players" are you referring to?
And being an amazing city is also not relative to having a great history as a club.
Clubs in France with "great" history are Saint Etienne, Marseille, Monaco, Reims, Bordeaux etc. Lyon sits above clubs like Sochaux, Lille and Nice but they do not have much tradition going for them.
Olympique Lyonnais was constantly struggling and was second fiddle in the city to FC Lyon (back when OL was called Racing Club de Lyon). In a way, Olympique Marseille was also the second team of the city as the first successful side was Stade Helvetique until the Swiss abandoned the city in the early 30s.
Their only relevant period was in the 60s, yet without any championships, and without any success in Europe apart from 2 good runs in the CWC (they even lost 4-0 to PAOK in the mid 70s), and they only surfaced as a strong team in the mid 90s and their only championships came in the 2000s. That's when they started to write history, because prior to that they were a team that was more known for winning Ligue2 than being a Ligue1 contender.
Apart from their birth year, Lyon are rather similar to PSG, very streaky relevance but with a period of huge dominance.
You're calling a club that hadn't finished in the top 3 until the early 1970s and barely finished top 5 in the league 8-9 times until they won the league. That's less than 10 times a Top Five team in France which always was fluid in terms of who's finishing around the top, in 50 years. That's literally Espanyol level until 2000... Would you claim that Espanyol has great history by any chance?
Oh and just consider that PSG that was formed in 1970 until 2000 managed to finish in the top five 13 times, winning the league twice in the process.
You cannot have "great history" as a club when your greatness was experienced by most of your current fanbase. That's even more audacious than saying Chelsea has great history...
At the moment they seem like an obvious top 5 French club, but it's not really a lock. Apart from Marseille and St Etienne who are locked, and potentially PSG who don't look like they're stopping any moment soon, you have two spots and teams like Monaco, Nantes and Reims competing for them along with Lyon. Problem for Lyon is that all their championships came in a single window (2000s) and they only have 3 trophies outside that window, 3 domestic cups from the 60s and 70s. That's not "great history". It's France and it's a weird setup, but even in that climate not even their own fans can claim that they have "great history".
Lyon overall is a great club, great fans as you said, amazing potential but they don't carry any "great history" with them. Maybe in 50 years people will view them as such, but I still remember Sonny Anderson as their main striker and their last matchday win vs Lens (was top spot by 1 pt) that secured them their first ever league was televised live in a pretty clear colored resolution...
You either don't know much of French football history or you want to talk about clubs with recent success as some sort of historic greatness as that would also elevate Barcelona into that, a club that was pretty solid for decades but nothing special (kinda like Spain's Dortmund) until the early 90s spiraled them into top team of Europe status and with a few ups and downs that was sustained over 3 decades.
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