Paris Saint-Germain will aim to continue their charge towards the Ligue 1 title when Clermont welcome them to the Stade Gabriel-Montpied on Saturday night.
The hosts went down 3-2 to Nantes in gameweek 30, while Mauricio Pochettino's men stormed to an emphatic 5-1 win at home to Lorient.
Match preview
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Truly defining the expression hero to zero, Clermont midfielder Salis Abdul Samed scored a peach of a long-range effort during the visit of Nantes after Saif-Eddine Khaoui had also responded to strikes from Ludovic Blas and Pedro Chirivella.
However, Randal Kolo Muani restored Nantes' one-goal lead not long after Abdul Samed's strike - with four goals on the day coming in a frantic 10-minute spell - and the Clermont lynchpin was then given his marching orders 20 minutes from time.
The 10 men of Clermont could not claw their way back into the game as they picked up where they left off following the international break - with a defeat. Their fourth on the bounce to be precise, and Pascal Gastien's side are certainly in the relegation dogfight now.
With just eight games left to play this term, Clermont are surviving by the skin of their teeth in 17th spot and are comfortably five points clear of 19th-placed Metz, but Saint-Etienne are only one point behind in the relegation playoff place.
Conceding an average of three goals per game in their last four defeats does not bode well for Clermont before a meeting with runaway leaders PSG, and only Bordeaux and Metz have performed worse on home soil this term than Gastien's leaky crop.
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If Kylian Mbappe's stock had not already risen enough this term, having a hand in all five of his side's goals against Lorient saw the Real Madrid target send a clear message to the PSG hierarchy amid renewed optimism surrounding a possible new deal.
Each member of Mauricio Pochettino's star-studded front three got in on the act against Lorient, with Neymar and Mbappe both bagging braces alongside Lionel Messi's third Ligue 1 goal of the season, and Lorient's only consolation via Terem Moffi came courtesy of a defensive lapse from Les Parisiens.
While a torrid March saw PSG dumped out of the Champions League and humbled in a 3-0 loss to Monaco, Pochettino's side came out all guns blazing against a formerly resilient Lorient side and are comfortably 12 points clear of Marseille at the summit.
PSG's prowess at the Parc des Princes is never up for debate, but Pochettino's side travel to Clermont having rather alarmingly lost each of their last four on the road in all competitions, and only one of their last seven away matches in Ligue 1 has ended in victory.
Furthermore, not since October's Classique draw with Marseille have Les Parisiens kept a clean sheet away from home in the top flight, but they breezed past Clermont 4-0 back in September in the capital, and now is as good a time as any to improve a surprisingly poor away streak.
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Team News
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Clermont's Abdul Samed has been handed a two-game ban for his sending off against Nantes with one of those matches suspended, so the defensively-minded Oriol Busquets could be drafted into the side here.
Cedric Hountondji, Elbasan Rashani, Jim Allevinah and Pierre-Yves Hamel remain absent for the visitors with their various injury problems, and Gastien does not expect the former to recover from a broken arm before the end of the season.
Vital N'Simba also left the field with a calf problem against Nantes and is unlikely to feature, but Lucas Da Cunha and Johan Gastien have both recovered from COVID-19 and Arthur Desmas has shaken off a hand issue.
Similarly, PSG have also witnessed a whole host of players enter the treatment room in recent days, with Leandro Paredes the latest to do so after undergoing surgery on a groin injury.
The Argentine is being kept company by Abdou Diallo, Angel Di Maria, Ander Herrera, Julian Draxler, Ismael Gharbi, Keylor Navas and Layvin Kurzawa, with none of them due to return in time for Saturday's game.
Juan Bernat and Marco Verratti have been training ahead of this game, but Sergio Ramos's return to action last week was not warmly received by the home crowd, who booed the injury-hit veteran throughout the contest.
Clermont possible starting lineup:
Djoco; Zedadka, Seidu, Ogier, Mendy; Khaoui, Magnin, Busquets; Da Cunha, Bayo, Dossou
Paris Saint-Germain possible starting lineup:
Donnarumma; Hakimi, Marquinhos, Kimpembe, Mendes; Pereira, Gueye, Wijnaldum; Messi, Mbappe, Neymar
We say: Clermont 0-4 Paris Saint-Germain
While both managers are dealing with an absentee crisis at present, Clermont will certainly be hit harder by their missing players than PSG will, with Pochettino still able to put out a daunting first XI.
Les Parisiens have made a habit of winning at home then immediately losing away, but an out-of-sorts Clermont side with a penchant for conceding goals ought to be blown away by the visiting crop this weekend.
Top tip
Ben Knapton
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Paris Saint-Germain win with a probability of 60.37%. A draw had a probability of 20.6% and a win for Clermont had a probability of 18.99%.
The most likely scoreline for a Paris Saint-Germain win was 1-2 with a probability of 9.91%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 0-2 (9.14%) and 0-1 (8.76%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 1-1 (9.5%), while for a Clermont win it was 2-1 (5.15%). The actual scoreline of 1-6 was predicted with a 0.5% likelihood. Our team at Sports Mole and our data analysis both correctly predicted that Paris Saint-Germain would win this match.
