There’s plenty of alliteration in Dermot’s selections for his 16/1 treble this week. Let’s hope all those L’s are converted into winners.
A third of the Ligue 1 season has now been played with the table looking almost the same as it did this time last year. There are however two teams who’s fortunes have completely flipped, 17th placed Strasbourg and 4th placed Lorient. The latter take on PSG on Saturday and try to emulate Troyes who put 3 goals past them last weekend. Les Merlus have a far better defence than ESTAC and will fancy causing an upset, especially with lead marksman Terem Moffi back from injury.
The game week as usual ends with the biggest clash of the weekend and Sunday is no exception. Olympique Marseille take on Olympique Lyon in the Vélodrome. It’s been a mixed season for both sides so far and below we’ll go into more detail into how the game might pan out.
Angers Vs Lens
Sat 5th 20:00 GMT
Aside from wins in weeks 7 & 8, Le SCO have lost 9 of their last 11 league games. So far Angers have had a pretty decent schedule of games but they are now in the middle of a run of games in which they play 6 of the top 7 – the only respite being a game against AC Ajaccio after the trip to Lille. They could be without talisman Soufiane Boufal which leaves an already light attack looking completely threadbare.
Lens sparkling form continued last weekend when they made a decent attacking side in Toulouse look ordinary. Les Violets were not allowed to play at all with Seko Fofana particularly impressive. Angers have a knack for scoring “garbage time” goals but any sort of a repeat performance from Lens should make this game a formality for Franck Haise’s side. Les Sang et Or are a decent price to overcome the -1 handicap with most places offering around 7/4.
Lille Vs Rennes
Sun 6th 16:05 GMT
The stats back up the selection of both teams to score and over 2.5 goals in this game without delving too much into each team. Lille have been BTTS in 10/13 games whilst it’s 9/13 for Rennes. The exact same number of times repeats for each side for over 2.5 goals (10/13 Vs 9/13). When the both BTTS & over 2.5 goals are combined Lille have had 9/13 games hit whilst it’s 6/13 for Rennes. The Thursday night Europa League fixture shouldn’t pose a big issue for the away side as they are W4 D1 L0 from 5 games after after a European game, scoring 15 goals in the process.
Marseille Vs Lyon
Sun 6th 19:45 GMT
A meeting of two sides who are potentially going in opposite directions. Igor Tudor could well lose his job after this game due to Marseille crashing out of the Champions League on Wednesday night. Tudor never passed along to the players what was required in terms of Europa League qualification and the last minute goal by Tottenham was due to them pushing on too much. A draw would have seen at least a continuation of their European campaign in UEFA’s second tier competition. As it stands, OM have lost 4 of their last 5 games between domestic and European games.
Laurent Blanc may have brought something to Lyon that has been long since lacking – resilience. In his 3 games so far they came back against Rennes (just outdone at the end), scored a last minute winner at Montpellier and scored a late winner against Lille. The latter being the most impressive as it’s a game OL would have lost earlier in the season. This game could be a similar story given how both sides are playing lately so I’ll side with a Lyon win here.
Smart Bets
Lens to Win -1 @ 19/10 (1pt win)
Lille & Rennes BTTS & Over 2.5 goal @ 19/20 (3pt win)
Lyon to win @ 21/10 (1pt win)
Above in treble (best priced): 16/1 (1pt win)
