LE HAVRE: Paris St-Germain extended their Ligue 1 advantage to four points with a 1-0 victory at Le Havre on Saturday thanks to a first-half goal from Bradley Barcola.

PSG lead second-placed RC Lens, who have stumbled over the last seven days with a 3-2 home loss to AS Monaco last weekend and a 1-1 draw at Racing Strasbourg on Friday.

PSG now have nine wins from their last 10 league games but it took 37 minutes for Barcola, in an unfamiliar centre forward role, to break the deadlock by heading home a Lee Kang-in cross.

Lee missed a good chance to double the score two minutes later and two minutes after that Dro Fernandez, recently signed from Barcelona, had an effort disallowed for offside.

Desire Doue should have made it 2-0 from the penalty spot in the 79th minute after being tripped by Lucas Gourna-Douath, but his effort was saved by Mory Diaw.

Le Havre, who stay nine points above the relegation zone in 13th place, struggled through most of the match but had a chance to equalise in the 54th minute when Issa Soumares shot on the turn forced Matvey Safonov into a sharp save.

“There are no nice and easy games for PSG because every match is important,” said PSG coach Luis Enrique. “We need to get players back and improve because we have less confidence than usual at the moment.”

Elsewhere in France on Saturday, Rennes made it two wins out of two under new coach Franck Haise as they beat Toulouse 1-0 in Brittany thanks to Arnaud Nordin’s first-half goal.

Monaco got back on track after losing to PSG in their Champions League play-off tie as USA star Folarin Balogun and Simon Adingra scored in a 2-0 win over Angers.

Balogun, who is expected to be a key player for the United States at the World Cup, now has 12 goals this season in all competitions, including four in his last four games.

Published in Dawn, March 2nd, 2026