Our prediction for this Ligue 1 match:
Auxerre
Match Time & Date:
16/04/2023
15:00
Prediction: 1-1
Nantes
Stade de l’Abbe-Deschamps will host Sunday’s football game between Auxerre and Nantes, the two teams who are almost level on points in the Ligue 1 standings. Auxerre aim to build on back-to-back wins over Troyes and Ajaccio, but this match will be anything but a walk in the park for the relegation-threatened hosts. Both Diego Mensah and Elisha Owusu are sidelined with injuries, but there are no suspended players in the home team.
Les Canaris, on the other hand, are five points clear of the relegation zone, meaning that they should be happy with one point from the match. Both Blas and Mostafa Mohamed are pushing for recalls to the starting XI after the duo came off the bench in a come-from-behind draw with Monaco. You should bear in mind that under 2.5 goals have been netted in five of the previous six meetings between the two teams in all competitions.
Highlighted Player (Alban Lafont):
Alban Lafont is a French goalkeeper who plays for Ligue 1 side Toulouse. Born in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, Lafont joined AS Lattoise youth school at the age of nine and he stayed at the academy until 2014 when he moved to Toulouse.
The 193-cm-tall goalkeeper has established himself as a first-choice goalkeeper at Toulouse and it has to be noted that he made 36 appearances for the club in the 2016/2017 season, keeping 10 clean sheets in the process. Due to his dual citizenship, Alban Lafont is eligible to represent both Burkina Faso and France on international stage, but he has yet to play for the African team.
Alban Lafont represented les Tricolores at youth level and, no doubt, there is a bright future ahead of the talented shoot-stopper who was born on January 23, 1999. The rising star has a contract with Toulouse which expires on June 30, 2020.
Highlighted Team (Nantes):
Founded on April 21, 1943 Nantes is a professional football club that compete in French Ligue 1. Les Canaris are considered one of the most famous French clubs and they had a lot of success during the sixties and the seventies. Nantes won their first Ligue 1 title in the 1964/1965 season and 36 years later (2000/2001) they clinched their eighth (last) domestic trophy.
Speaking of the club’s European success, les Canaris did well to make it to the Champions League semis in 1996, but Italian giants Juventus proved to be a big catch for the French outfit. Nantes welcome their rivals at La Beaujoire-Louis Fonteneau and the capacity of the stadium is 38.004.
The likes of Vahid Halilhodzic, Adel Selimi, Michel Der Zakarian, Viorel Moldovan, Mario Yepes, Marcel Desailly, Didier Deschamps, Claude Makelele, Christian Karembeu and Dimitri Payet are the notable footballers who played for the club in the past. Nantes are well known for their yellow jerseys and that is the reason why they are nicknamed the Canaries (les Canaris).
