A brace of tries from Sam James was in vain as Sale Sharks squandered a 14-point lead in a 27-24 defeat at Lyon in the Challenge Cup.

The current French Top 14 leaders went ahead in the Pool Two encounter through Lionel Beauxis' penalty but were left reeling by Denny Solomona and James touching down inside the opening quarter of an hour.

Former England full-back Delon Armitage cut the deficit to four points at the interval with his try, only for Sale to open up a 24-10 lead following James' second of the night, with Faf de Klerk booting the conversion and then a penalty.

Quickfire converted tries from Liam Gill and Theo Belan levelled things up with 10 minutes remaining.

Sale had drawn their opening fixture against Toulouse last week but there was to be no consolation of a stalemate in France as Frederic Michalak split the posts five minutes from time after Sale had been penalised for being offside inside their own 22.