LILLE, France — Following a disappointing exit from the French Cup, Lille continued its challenging week on Saturday as they suffered a 2-1 defeat against Le Havre, who were sitting at the bottom of the league table.
Le Havre managed to secure the victory thanks to goals from Egyptian forward Kouka and Senegalese striker Issa Soumaré, who scored his first goal for the club. This win marked an end to Le Havre’s nine-match winless streak across all competitions and allowed them to temporarily rise from the bottom of the standings, depending on the outcome of Montpellier’s match against Strasbourg scheduled for Sunday.
Lille’s late effort came from substitute Chuba Akpom, who scored in the seventh minute of stoppage time during his league debut. Unfortunately, it proved to be too late to change the outcome for the home side. Despite a strong showing in the Champions League recently, where they triumphed over Feyenoord 6-1 to advance to the knockout stage, Lille has struggled in the league. They had just rallied from behind to defeat St. Etienne 4-1 in their previous French league match. However, a midweek disappointment saw them concede a 2-0 advantage against Dunkerque in the French Cup, culminating in a penalty shootout loss. With this latest defeat, Lille slipped to fifth place in the league, marking their fourth loss of the season.
In other matches occurring earlier on Saturday, Nice took advantage of Monaco’s prior defeat, moving into third place with a 2-0 victory over a Lens side reduced to ten men. The visitors’ discipline issues were evident, as Adrien Thomasson gave away an early penalty for a foul on Hicham Boudaoui, which Gaëtan Laborde converted. Lens faced further setbacks when defender Fucundo Medina received a second yellow card and was sent off in the 57th minute; Jonathan Clauss scored the final goal against his former club shortly after. Meanwhile, Monaco faced a heavy 4-1 loss against league leaders, Paris Saint-Germain, the previous night.
Rennes also found success under new coaching management, defeating Saint-Etienne 2-0 with a late goal from substitute Mahamadou Nagida. This victory marked two wins out of two for coach Habib Beye, as Nagida found the net shortly after substituting in during the 84th minute, following an earlier goal from Arnaud Kalimuendo. Beye’s appointment follows a turbulent spell for Rennes, as they aim to recover from five consecutive defeats under former coaches Jorge Sampaoli and Julien Stephan. The club made significant investments during the winter transfer window, exceeding 70 million euros ($73 million), and this victory lifted them from 15th to 11th place in the standings, with more matches of the 21st round remaining to be played.
