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Discipline has Lille on top Posted: Sunday August 17, 2003 2:42 PMLILLE, France (Reuters) -- After narrowly escaping relegation in May, modest Lille have created a sensation by claiming top spot in Ligue 1. The small club from the north upset champions Olympique Lyon in their opening match before taming ambitious Paris St. Germain and then crushing promoted Toulouse 3-0 away on Saturday to become the only team with a maximum nine points. Olympique Marseille were playing at Lille's neighbours RC Lens on Sunday evening with a chance of sharing the lead but needing to win by at least three goals to overtake Lille on goal difference. Lille were very discreet in the transfer market during the close season, signing only one player, Mathieu Bodmer from second-division Caen. They have one of the youngest teams in the first division with an average age of 24 and nobody, not even the club's officials, expected such a flying start. At best their ambition was again to avoid relegation. "Nobody forecast such a good start," said their 41-year-old coach Claude Puel, who took over from the charismatic Vahid Halilhodzic last year. "What surprises me is the maturity of the team. I knew that by making very few changes I would give them more solidity and cohesion. "The guys got to know each other last season but I was a long way from guessing that they could adapt so swiftly to the demanding standards in the soccer elite." Thanks to a solid and very disciplined team, Lille have not conceded a goal in their three matches and they confirmed they are very hard to beat.
CohesionBoth Lyon and PSG slumped at the Grimpoprez-Jooris stadium in Lille through a lack of inspiration and failure to break the lock of a stubborn defense. "My key word is cohesion. Despite a poor start we finished pretty well last season thanks to several outings in which we didn't concede goals," said Puel, who steered Monaco to the championship title in 2000. "Actually we are carrying on in the same vein. To me, what we are doing now is just the continuation of what we did by the end of last season. There has been no break during the summer." But Puel remains cautious about the future and refused to get carried away when asked if Lille were now aiming to play an outsider's role in the title race. "We must keep a cool head. We know what we are capable of and we don't pretend to be what we are not," Puel said. "What I'm certain of is that if the team carry on working with discipline and will we can do something good this season." "It's too soon to be fired with enthusiasm. We are the sensation of the beginning of the season, we are not the sensation of the whole championship," said captain and goalkeeper Gregory Wimbee.
Copyright 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. |
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