Marseille will be looking to bounce back from yet another dismal night in the Champions League when they play host to Nantes at the Orange Velodrome in Saturday's Ligue 1 showdown.
Les Olympiens lost 2-0 on their own turf to Porto in midweek, while Nantes also took to the pitch on Wednesday, playing out a 1-1 draw with Lens in the league.
Match preview
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Marseille's Champions League dream is over. Andre Villas-Boas's men are the only team in the group stage of Europe's premier competition yet to hit the back of the net and Porto cruised to a 2-0 victory at the Orange Velodrome in midweek.
The Portuguese giants put one foot firmly in the knockout stages as Zaidu Sanusi and Sergio Oliveira struck on Wednesday evening, with the two sides both finishing the game with 10 men after Leonardo Balerdi and Marko Grujic were given their marching orders.
While Les Olympiens can still finish third and pave the way for a route into the Europa League, the last thing that Villas-Boas needs is more fixture congestion as Marseille turn their attention to the French top flight, where they have been performing strongly despite their Champions League woes.
Marseille have won three games in succession in Ligue 1 as Strasbourg, Lorient and Bordeaux have all been put to the sword by Les Olympiens recently, but Villas-Boas must address his side's problems in attack if Marseille are to extend their unbeaten run over the coming weeks.
Indeed, Marseille's two out-and-out strikers - Valere Germain and Dario Benedetto - have only mustered one goal and one assist between them in all competitions this season - with the latter still waiting to make the net ripple in the 2020-21 campaign.
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While Marseille were competing against Porto, Nantes played out their game with Lens on Wednesday evening - a fixture which was initially postponed due to a coronavirus cluster in the Lens camp.
Nantes managed to take a point from their clash with the newly-promoted high-flyers as both sides chalked up one goal on the night, with Gael Kakuta opening the scoring for Lens before Abdoulaye Toure equalised from the penalty spot.
Things are now looking up for Christian Gourcuff's men who have put together a three-game unbeaten run in Ligue 1 - the only side in the bottom half to have done so - with Nantes' only defeat in their last five outings coming against leaders Paris Saint-Germain on Halloween.
Les Canaris' recent record against Marseille is certainly nothing to be sniffed at either; Nantes have not lost to Les Olympiens since 2017 and marched to a resounding 3-1 victory on Marseille's turf last season.
Marseille Ligue 1 form: DDDWWW
Marseille form (all competitions): LWLLWL
Nantes Ligue 1 form: LWLWDD
Team News
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Balerdi's sending off in the Champions League does not affect his participation in the top flight, but the Borussia Dortmund loanee will likely make way for Duje Caleta-Car this weekend.
Marseille have been relatively fortunate on the injury front this season, with Les Olympiens' only absentee being Nemanja Radonjic, who is set for two weeks on the sidelines with a thigh problem.
Villas-Boas could put his faith in Benedetto to break his goalscoring duck this weekend, while Dimitri Payet will be hopeful of earning a recall to the starting XI as well.
Meanwhile, Nantes are sure to make a couple of alterations having not had much time to recover, although Moses Simon is still recovering from a groin injury.
Charles Traore, Pedro Chirivella and Marcus Coco are all in line for recalls to the starting XI, while Kalifa Coulibaly is an option for change up top.
Marseille possible starting lineup:
Mandanda; Sakai, Gonzalez, Caleta-Car, Amavi; Kamara, Rongier, Sanson; Cuisance; Thauvin, Benedetto
Nantes possible starting lineup:
Lafont; Corchia, Pallois, Girotto, Traore; Chirivella, Toure; Louza, Blas, Coco; Coulibaly
We say: Marseille 2-1 Nantes
Marseille cannot rely on Florian Thauvin as their main goal threat despite the Frenchman's evident talent, and Nantes will take confidence from the fact that Les Olympiens are sure to be disheartened from their abysmal performance in Europe. Nevertheless, Villas-Boas's men have produced the goods in the league and Nantes have had little time to rest as well, so we expect Marseille to take the spoils, but it will not be a comfortable victory by any means.
Top betting 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 Marseille win with a probability of 38.05%. A win for Nantes had a probability of 32.75% and a draw had a probability of 29.2%.
The most likely scoreline for a Marseille win was 1-0 with a probability of 12.88%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-1 (7.67%) and 2-0 (7.37%). The likeliest Nantes win was 0-1 (11.7%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (13.39%). The actual scoreline of 3-1 was predicted with a 2.9% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Marseille would win this match.
