Portuguese trio Bernardo Silva, Fabio Coentrao and Helder Costa were

all on target as Monaco climbed to second in Ligue 1 on Sunday thanks to

a 4-0 defeat of Toulouse.

Monaco still trail runaway leaders Paris Saint Germain, who beat

Angers 5-1 Saturday, by 21 points, but climbed three clear of Nice, who

had been second overnight after their 2-1 win at home to Lorient.

“The thing will be to keep a minimum of three points between us and

third place until the end of the season,” said Monaco midfielder Tiemoue

Bakayoko.

The victory also left Monaco nine points clear of Lyon and Marseille,

who contested a high-octane 1-1 draw at Lyon’s new stadium in Sunday’s

late match.

Marseille can thank their captain and goalkeeper Steve Mandanda for

his 10 saves, one of them a magnificent one-handed stop from a Mathieu

Valbuena strike just before Marseille’s 65th minute opener.

“We deserved the draw and although a point doesn’t do much for us

Lyon played really well, so in a way it was a relief not to lose,”

Mandanda said after the game.

The visitors went ahead against the run of play when Remy Cabella

unleashed a fierce strike from the edge of the box when perfectly teed

up by Michy Batshuayi.

And while Lyon equalised through Corentin Tolisso on 79 minutes to

set up a pulsating finish, Lyon may see this as two points dropped.

Third last season behind PSG and Lyon, Monaco outclassed relegation

threatened Toulouse as Argentine Guido Carrillo also got on the

scoresheet.

It was the first time the team have scored four this season and they

did so with new recruit, Brazilian striker Wagner Love, watching from

the stands.

“We played well for a change,” Monaco’s Portuguese handler Leonardo Jardim joked afterwards.

“And we saved a penalty at 2-0 which may have changed the game,”

Jardim said of Croat ‘keeper Danijel Subasic’s fine effort to keep out

Wissam Ben Yedder spot-kick.

Saint Etienne blew a chance to climb to fourth when they gave up a

last minute goal at Reims, who earned a 1-1 draw which saw them climb

clear of the drop zone. 

On Saturday, Zlatan Ibrahimovic opened the scoring for PSG at the

Parc des Princes with his 17th league goal of the season before Lucas

doubled the lead for Laurent Blanc’s side just before half-time.

The floodgates then opened after the break with Gregory Van der Wiel

rounding off a superb team move for PSG’s third, only for Pierrick

Capelle to pull one back, but Angel Di Maria then scored twice in the

space of four minutes to complete the rout.

Hatem Ben Arfa netted his 10th goal of the season as Nice beat

Lorient 2-1 while on Friday new Rennes coach Rolland Courbis oversaw

their first home win in ten matches – 1-0 over Gazelec-Ajaccio – as they

climbed to fourth.

Troyes finally registered their first win of the season after coming

from behind to win 3-1 at Lille, with Bordeaux rallying late on to draw

2-2 at Nantes.