AS Monaco vs. Olympique Lyonnais 2/5/22 Ligue 1 Soccer Pick, Predictions, and Odds

AS Monaco is hosting Olympique Lyonnais at Stade Louis II in round 23 of the French Ligue 1. Monaco has been playing well under the new head coach, they are in solid form right now, but they are still no good defensively. Lyon has beaten Marseille earlier this week, they have sold a couple of players in the January transfer window, but they are still good enough.

Monaco is now in 8^th place in the Ligue 1 standings with 33 points, they have scored a solid 35 goals, but they have also conceded 26 goals, which is an average of over 1 conceded goal per game. Ben Yedder is the leading goalscorer for Monaco with 13 goals so far this season, while Henrique has added 5 assists. There are a few injured players in Monaco right now, and even more questionable players, but all of their best players are available. Monaco will also be playing in the Europa League, but it’s still unknown against who. I think Monaco is a solid team, I do think it was unfair of them to fire Kovac as their head coach, but they have the right to do so.

Lyon was playing against Marseille at home earlier this week, and that was a game where Lyon was losing 0-1, but with 2 scored goals late in the second half, Lyon was able to get a nice home win. Thanks to this win, Lyon has climbed to 7^th place with 34 points, 31 scored goals, and 28 conceded goals. The bad news for Lyon is they have solid Slimani and Guimares last week, and those were two very important players on their team. With 7 scored goals each, Dembele and Paqueta are the leading goalscorers for Lyon, while Shaqiri has added 3 assists. Ekambi is still o the African Cup of Nations, while Denayer, Da Silva, and Aouar are all injured. Lyon used to be the top team in the league, they have won the title a lot of times, but they just can’t stop being average over the last few seasons. Lyon is still pretty close to getting to that Champions or the Europa League spot, but without replacing the players they lost, that will be a hard thing to accomplish.

These two teams are of similar quality, they are separated by only 2 points in the standings, and for that reason, I think this will be a competitive game. This is one of the biggest derbies in France, and I see goals.