Marseille shock Lyon

Marseille striker Mamadou Niang successfully converts a penalty as the Lyon goalkeeper dives the wrong way during their Ligue 1 clash at the Stade Gerland in Lyon on Sunday.Photo: AFP

Strugglers Marseille showed current form cannot always gauge the outcome as they beat French league leaders Lyon 2-1 for only their third win of the season thanks to two goals from Mamadou Niang.
An eventful first half ultimately decided the match between two of France's big clubs though Marseille's fourth-from-bottom position hardly gives credence to their major team status.
Karim Benzema, the league's top scorer with 11 goals, was left on the bench by Lyon coach Alain Perrin, who instead installed Brazilian Fred at centre forward for a match where Juninho celebrated his 200th league appearance for Lyon.
The 32-year-old Brazilian Juninho, who arrived at the reigning six-times French champions in 2001, soon made his mark in his gala match.
After just seven minutes, Nadir Belhadj had a shot badly dealt with by Marseille keeper Steve Mandanda and the ball fell nicely for Juninho who fired into an empty net.
Lyon only had three minutes to savour their lead before visitors Marseille drew level. Lyon's Sebastien Squillaci tugged the shirt of Senegal's Niang in the penalty area and Niang himself converted the penalty, sending Remy Vercoutre the wrong way with the outside of his right foot.
An overhead kick on target from Niang shortly afterwards showed his confidence and Marseille began to come more into the match, deserving to take the lead just before the interval.
The Senegalese Niang raced past Lyon's defence on the edge of the area before beating Vercoutre with a right foot shot in the 44th minute.
Marseille continued to play impressively in the second half but no more goals were added to the score though Niang should have completed his hat-trick with seconds to go when he shot straight at the grounded Vercoutre.
Marseille coach Eric Gerets said afterwards: "It was a match where we had a lot of chances to score and though quality was sometimes lacking, there was always a lot of suspense. Finally I think we deserved to win."
Lyon, on 31 points, are three points ahead of second-placed Nancy who could only draw 0-0 at Paris Saint Germain on Saturday. It meant PSG fans had still not celebrated a home win this season.
PSG, seemingly in continual crisis for the past few years and in the bottom half of the table, continued to disappoint demanding fans who thought the corner might have been turned following a 2-0 League Cup win over Montpellier and last week's 2-1 league victory over Strasbourg.
The one item of cheer for PSG was that they ended a run of three home league defeats against Bordeaux, Rennes and Lyon.
Surprise package Le Mans, known more for 24 hour motor racing, beat St Etienne 3-2 in Saturday's early match to put them in fifth place.