Saturday, September 27, 2014

Toulouse vs. Paris Saint-Germain Preview

Paris Saint-Germain will have the chance to move level on points with Marseille at the top of Ligue 1 for 24 hours at least when they take on Toulouse on Saturday.

The champions currently sit three points behind the league leaders, who are not in action until they host Saint-Etienne on Sunday night.

PSG go into the game still unbeaten in all competitions this season, although four draws from their opening seven league matches is not exactly the form that they would have been hoping for.

They returned to winning ways on Wednesday with a 2-0 victory over Caen, ending a run of three consecutive draws in all competitions.

That result came despite the absence of star striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who missed the match with a heel injury and remains a doubt for this weekend.

Ezequiel Lavezzi also has question marks over his fitness, while Thiago Silva is still sidelined through injury. Marquinhos will fill in for his compatriot once again having netted the second goal in the win over Caen.

Jean Christophe Bahebeck is likely to replace Lavezzi having come on in the 13th minute on Wednesday, meaning that Edinson Cavani should once again be handed his favoured central role up front.

Toulouse, meanwhile, have struggled to find any sort of consistency so far this season, winning three, drawing one and losing three of their opening seven matches.

However, they do come into this match on the back of an impressive 3-0 victory over Rennes, and also boast an extra day of recovery time having played on Tuesday instead of Wednesday.

A shock victory this weekend would see them string back-to-back wins together for the first time since March, when Rennes were also amongst their victims.

Alain Casanova will be happy to have his side back in the Stadium Municipal, having not been beaten there for six matches stretching back to the last campaign.

The hosts will be without Martin Braithwaite, William Matheus and Uro Spaji through injury, while Etienne Didot is also a doubt having been withdrawn after half an hour of the win over Rennes.

Recent form

Toulouse: WDLWLW

PSG: WDDDWD

Possible starting lineups

Toulouse: Boucher; Veskovac, Grigore, Moubandje; Tisserand, Regattin, Doumbia, Akpa Akpro, Aguilar; Ben Yedder, Pesic

PSG: Sirigu; Van Der Wiel; Marquinhos, Luiz, Maxwell; Pastore, Motta, Cabaye; Lucas, Cavani, Bahebeck

Kick Off Time - 16:00HRS

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