Auxerre aim to extend winning run against struggling Le Mans
Auxerre welcome Le Mans to the Stade de l'Abbé-Deschamps on matchday 8 of Ligue 1, with the hosts arriving in considerably better shape than their visitors. Auxerre have won four of their last five matches, losing only once in that spell, while Le Mans have managed just a single win and a draw against three defeats across the same number of games.
Form tells its own story
The contrast in recent results is stark. Auxerre's run of four wins from five has them playing with real momentum heading into this fixture, whereas Le Mans have found victories hard to come by, with three losses weighing on their recent record.
That gap in current form marks Auxerre out as clearly the side in the ascendancy going into the weekend.
A history that favours the hosts
The two sides have met five times in recorded fixtures stretching back over a decade, and Auxerre have come out on top in three of those encounters, including a 3-2 win in a 2020 friendly and two Ligue 2 victories either side of that, in January and August 2019.
Le Mans do have one win to point to, a 3-1 success back in August 2012, and the pair also shared a 1-1 draw in January 2013, showing that the fixture has not always gone the way recent form might suggest.