Toulouse vs St Etienne Predictions

Toulouse are unbeaten in their last five and will be looking for their fourth win of the season and first over the Verts in five attempts.

Toulouse only remained in the league by the skin of their teeth last season, having to beat Ajaccio in a play-off final just to take part in this campaign. They have since brought back Alain Casanova for his second stint in charge of the club and so far, he has managed to continue the form that he left the team in three years ago. Casanova took Toulouse from relegation scrappers to top-ten finishers and he looks on course to do that again, as the team had fallen away in recent years without the Frenchman.

Toulouse only won nine games last year, but the Violets are already a third of the way there with three wins from their opening six games. They lost to Marseille 4-0 on the opening day of the season but that didn’t buck their confidence as they have been fantastic since. Confident wins over some of the weaker teams like Nimes (1-0) and Guingamp (2-1) have been joined by steely performances against quality teams such as Monaco (1-1) and Bordeaux (2-1) which has made it such an all-round successful season for Toulouse so far.

Casanova has got the best out of players like Max Gradel and Aaron Leya Iseka, who have looked reinvigorated after some tired years in their careers. Ibrahim Sangare and John Bostock playing in the same team still looks odd but they have been pivotal parts of the Toulouse machine and will be crucial in this game against a very physical Saint-Etienne midfield.

Saint-Étienne finished 7th last year, one point off Europa League qualification, but they have looked far off the quality of a European side this season. They currently sit in 8th which isn’t terrible, but they have lacked the necessary firepower to get further up the table. They have drawn half of their games this season and the loss of Jonathan Bamba, who contributed to a large bulk of their goals last season, has been detrimental. The young Frenchman scored seven and assisted eight goals last season but has been missed this year, as Étienne have drawn against some pretty poor teams.

They have only scored three times this campaign but would be sitting second if they could have converted their three draws into wins. Strasbourg (1-1), Montpellier (0-0) and Amiens (0-0) all finished well below Étienne last season and the Verts actually won four of the six games against these teams last year but this time round they could only score once as they couldn’t garner any creativity to get past these extremely average sides.

Saint-Étienne’s lack of goals has already been a problem, but they have been saved on three occasions by their opposition being equally as toothless. Toulouse are not the type of team to give you an inch though and if the Verts don’t start to get more ruthless in an attacking sense then the Violets could tear them apart.

Saint-Étienne were better in their win against Caen at the weekend, but their goals were a penalty and a goal-line scramble, so they will need to carve out better chances to get past a defence that have only conceded three in their last five. Toulouse have won four and drawn one of their last five home games and have looked fantastic under Alain Casanova, with three wins and two draws in their last five matches. They have only failed to score twice in their last 12 games, while Saint-Étienne have only kept three clean sheets in their last nine. The Verts haven’t won any of their last four away games and with them in pretty poor form, we’re going to back a tight Toulouse win 1-0.