Friday evening brings us further action from the French top flight and the upcoming Ligue 1 clash between hosts, Lille, and their visitors, St Etienne, with both teams needing the three points at either ends of the table.
Lille grabbed a third win in four matches on the weekend in the domestic top flight after recording a comprehensive 4-0 rout at home against Clermont which helped the hosts up into 7th place and it goes without saying that Lille will be keen to repeat that scoreline when they play host to lowly St Etienne in Friday night’s encounter at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy.
Zhegrova opens his account 🤩#LOSC | #LOSCCF63 | @Ligue1_ENG pic.twitter.com/vazPHYV0vg https://t.co/SbkYWyjM1x— LOSC (@LOSC_EN) March 8, 2022
Zhegrova opens his account 🤩#LOSC | #LOSCCF63 | @Ligue1_ENG pic.twitter.com/vazPHYV0vg https://t.co/SbkYWyjM1x
Despite suffering back-to-back losses against Brest and PSG, Lille have responded in positive fashion by recording wins against Montpellier and Lyon along with a point in a draw with Metz, while the hosts have lost just two of their last 15 matches overall.
Form and results on home soil at their Stade Pierre-Mauroy are also cause for optimism around the Lille camp.
The hosts have lost just once out of their last 12 games and that was to the Ligue 1 leaders, PSG.
St Etienne themselves grabbed a fourth win in their last six matches overall in the French top flight on the weekend when they registered a 1-0 home win over Metz which has just about helped the visitors keep their heads above water for the time being.
However, St Etienne are certainly not out of the woods by any means and although they’ve recorded earlier wins against Angers, Montpellier and Clermont, the visitors had had to endure a miserable run of results in Ligue 1 which saw them lose seven straight games on the trot.
Results away from home have also hampered St Etienne’s ambitions of moving away from the relegation zone in the French top flight.
The visitors have managed to collect just three wins out of their last 14 outings on their travels, which also includes eight defeats, just three clean sheets and failing to score themselves in five of these games as well.
Lille are unbeaten in each of the previous six meetings against St Etienne and this trend looks set to continue on Friday night with Lille running out winners and climbing into the top five of Ligue 1 in the process.