A rousing 4-1 home win over Dijon gave Lyon the perfect start to their new Ligue 1 campaign and suggested much promise for the upcoming season for Sunday’s hosts, but subsequent results have been a little disappointing in contrast.
Lyon have since failed to win any of their following four matches in the French top flight but have lost just once in a 2-1 defeat away from home at Montpellier, with the other three matches ending in stalemate as Lyon have at least picked up points in draws with Bordeaux, Nimes and Lorient.
The hosts finished last season’s curtailed campaign in 7th place and when the season was halted, they were some nine points adrift of Lille and the top four as they were unable to produce any sort of results on a consistent basis.
Lyon recorded 5 wins, 4 draws and 4 defeats while scoring 17 goals and conceding just seven in reply, but recent results at home have at least steadied the ship as Lyon are unbeaten in their last six matches overall at their Groupama Stadium, which includes three draws.
Marseille enjoyed a successful season last term as they finished runners-up behind perennial champions, PSG, but in truth they too found themselves some way off the pace as there was a 12-point gap separating them from the Paris-based champions when the season was cancelled.
Nevertheless, just one defeat from their final 17 matches of the season is nothing to be sneezed at and the visitors had seemingly started this new Ligue 1 campaign where they left off at the end of last term.
Marseille recorded early back-to-back wins against Brest and PSG (both of which were away from home) in 3-2 and 1-0 wins respectively, but they too have struggled for results in recent times as they’ve failed to win any of their subsequent three league matches, despite being at their Orange Vélodrome.
A 2-0 defeat to Saint-Etienne has been followed by draws with Lille and Metz, both being 1-1 stalemates, but they’ve been impressive on their travels as the visitors have put together a 10-match unbeaten run overall.
This impressive sequence of results includes eight wins but Marseille have tended to struggle for results when visiting Lyon as they’ve failed to beat their hosts in each of their last nine encounters at the Groupama Stadium.
With both Lyon and Marseille fairly evenly matched prior to this clash, honours could be even on Sunday.