In the match of the 23rd round of the French championship Lille will play Monaco at home. The meeting is of great importance for the fight for a place in the Champions League next season. Lille are in fifth place in the standings, two points ahead of Lyon and the same number of points behind Monaco, who have equal points with Nice. The pair are six points behind Marseille, so they are probably fighting for third place.

Lille beat Rennes 2-0 away in the previous round, before that it lost unexpectedly at home to Le Havre (1-2) and was knocked out of the French Cup by Dunkirk in a penalty shoot-out after a 1-1 draw. That was preceded by defeats to St Etienne (4-1) in Ligue 1 and Feyenoord (6-1) in the Champions League.

Monaco have a more varied life. Adi Hütter's team crashed out of the Champions League after losing in the knockout stages on aggregate to Benfica (0-1 and 3-3). In between those matches was a 7-1 rout of Nantes in the French league. Earlier there was a defeat from PSG (1:4) in the same championship. So the game of the Monegasques can be called as unstable as possible. Interestingly, they won only one match out of the last 11 away in all tournaments. They have quite effective and sharp attack, but very weak defence, making a lot of mistakes.

On the other hand, Lille haven't lost at home since September, but they lost twice in their last two matches in February. So it's not all straightforward, despite a nil draw in the first round between the current opponents.