A great current position in 3rd place. A 16 point lead on Lyon, trailing Paris by 2 and Monaco by 4 (with each opposition having a game in hand): this is the way things stand at the top of the championship at the start of April. After their victory over Bordeaux, one question was asked of the Aiglons: are you looking ahead or behind you? The answers reflect perfectly the space between them at the moment.

Jean-Pierre Rivère: “It is far from being decided on the podium, and that’s not political talk. Lyon still have a game in hand (and play against Metz on Wednesday, Editor’s note) and we have a tough schedule. We need to keep on picking up points as we go. And if teams behind us drop points, that’s good too. But we are focussing on our own game.”

Valentin Eysseric: “Mathematically, it still isn’t over. If we want to finish in a good 3rd position, we need to aim for 2nd and 1st place, because we are not far from that. It’s down to us to continue and to not be afraid of objectives like that. If we have to finish 3rd, we will finish 3rd, but we can’t focus on Lyon and their results. We need to concentrate on us and what is ahead of us.”

Dante: “We see where we are, there are 7 matches to go. We aren’t going to say we don’t care about Paris and that we aren’t watching them. We are close; we want to continue moving forward and to progress in the game. We need to work at our best in each game, and then, in May, we will see where we are.”

Yoan Cardinale: “Whilst mathematically, we aren’t sure of 3rd place, we won’t be celebrating anything. After that, we aren’t only looking below us but also above us.
We are looking at Monaco and PSG. Without getting into a panic or getting worked up for no reason, but we are still looking…”

Vincent Koziello: “You always need to stay alert. 16 points on Lyon, they have played a match less, that could become 13. And then for the last game, we travel there. The title? That will be very difficult. Honestly, Paris and Monaco walk on water. I saw the final of the Coupe de la Ligue and I thought that they were two excellent teams. But you never know in football.”

Arnaud Souquet: “It was good to win against Bordeaux because whatever we say, we had not been as good recently, even though we remained on a good run. We are 3rd but have played one more match than Paris and Monaco. They will play their own season, and we will too, and we will do the maths at the end.”

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