Ligue 1 Week 16 action - Grenoble get off the mark. Finally
Wednesday 09 December 2009
Week 16 in Le Championnat delivered some fantastically unpredictable contests, which have become typical of the French top flight.
The weekend’s biggest winners have to be bottom club Grenoble, who notched up their maiden victory of the season, defeating Toulouse at the Stade des Alpes. Midfielder Nicolas Dieuze nearly tore the net from the goal posts in smashing home the winner as the game looked set to finish as a goalless draw. The goal will be regarded as Grenoble’s most important of the season and provide fans and players with the belief that they are capable of getting results in the French top flight. Although still firmly rooted to the bottom of the table and nine points from safety, Mécha Bazdarevic’s team are undefeated in four outings following impressive draws against Lyon, Lorient and Monaco.
Bordeaux extended their lead at the summit to five points following victory over PSG at the Stade Chaban-Delmas. Jaroslav Plašil headed home for Les Girondins midway through the first half to score the only goal of the game. The result means that Bordeaux now lead the way by five points at the top of the table from Montpellier who have slowly moved up the ranks seemingly unnoticed in recent weeks. L'equip blaugrana routinely defeated Le Mans after goals from Karim Ait Fana and Lilian Compan cancelled out Anthony Le Tallec’s equaliser.
Lyon are now without a win in Ligue 1 in over a month, stretching back to Week 12 following defeat away at Lille in a seven-goal thriller. A first half Lisandro Lopez hat-trick was not enough to give Les Gones victory as the stunning Gervinho proved his worth by netting an injury-time winner, which was his second of the contest. The Brazilian scored his sixth and seventh goals of the season to complete a dramatic comeback for Les Dogues, who produced a stunning performance to defeat the seven-time champions Lyon.
Marseille continued to rise up the table with an easy 3-1 victory over south coast rivals Nice. Mamadou Niang, Lucho Gonzales and Bakari Kone each netted to send Les Phocéens into seventh place, knowing that a victory in their game in hand will propel them into second place only three points behind leaders Bordeaux.
High-flying Auxerre suffered a shock defeat at home to Nancy at the Stade Abbe Deschamps. The home side were largely dominant but were unable to convert this into goals, with Nancy uncharacteristically clinical in front of goal, with goals from Andre Luiz, Abdeslam Ouaddou and Youssouf Hadji completing an impressive victory for the away team. Valenciennes took advantage of the faltering performances of teams in the top six to move up to third place after defeating Monaco 3-1 at the Stade Nungesser. Boulogne halted a worrying run of 12 games without a win following a home victory against fellow strugglers Lens. In other matches Saint Etienne and Sochaux played out a dull scoreless draw and Lorient narrowly lost away at Stade Rennais.
Full results
Saturday 5 December, 2009
Montpellier 2-1 Le Mans
Nice 1-3 Marseille
Stade Rennais 1-0 Lorient
Saint-Etienne 0-0 Sochaux
Valenciennes 3-1 Monaco
Bordeaux 1-0 PSG
Sunday 6 December, 2009
Auxerre 1-3 Nancy
Boulogne 2-1 Lens
Grenoble 2-1 Toulouse
Lille 4-3 Lyon
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