Depay hits hat-trick in Lyon romp

Paris (AFP) – Lyon climbed to fourth in Ligue 1 on Sunday with a 5-0 away win at promoted Troyes as Dutch striker Memphis Depay scored a second-half hat-trick.

The 23-year-old Depay joined Lyon in January 2017 from Manchester United and is finding his feet in France now that Lyon have sold Alexandre Lacazette to Arsenal.

The wins puts Lyon in fourth on 19 points from 10 games, six behind leaders Paris Saint Germain, who play at Marseille in Sunday’s late game.

PSG are three points clear of second-placed Monaco, who beat Caen 2-0 on Saturday with Ligue 1’s leading scorer Radamel Falcao netting a penalty for his 13th goal of the campaign.

Depay’s goals came from a near-post tap-in, a shot into the top corner and after winning a penalty he insisted, at length with fellow striker Mariano, on taking the spot-kick, which he converted with a cheeky chip down the middle as the keeper went left.

Mali’s Bertrand Traore opened the scoring on 21 minutes with former Real Madrid man Mariano rounding off the scoring at the death.

Earlier Sunday the injured Mario Balotelli watched from the stands as Nice slumped to another defeat, going down 2-1 at home to Strasbourg.

The Italian striker, scorer of five league goals this season, was absent with a calf injury and without him Lucien Favre’s team went down to their third successive league defeat and a fourth straight loss in all competitions.

Nuno Da Costa scored twice for the promoted visitors before Nice got a goal back, Pierre Lees-Melou converting a penalty after Strasbourg’s Ernest Seka was sent off for a foul in the area.

Wesley Sneijder, on as a second-half substitute, came close to equalising for Nice, but they went down to their sixth loss already this campaign.

The side who finished third last season are currently 14th and go to Paris Saint-Germain next Friday.

Meanwhile, bottom club Metz sacked coach Philippe Hinschberger on Sunday, a day after going down to their ninth defeat in 10 league games this season, 2-1 at home to Dijon.

Hinschberger is the first managerial casualty of the campaign in France’s top flight.