Lyon keep up pressure

Lyon closed the gap on fourth-placed St Etienne back to two points with a convincing 4-1 win at home to Bastia.

Lyon closed the gap on fourth-placed St Etienne back to two points with a convincing 4-1 win at home to Bastia. Goals from Bafetimbi Gomis, Nabil Fekir, Bakary Kone and Alexandre Lacazette ensured a successful afternoon for Les Gones, who made it two Ligue 1 wins on the bounce at the Stade Gerland following their 1-0 defeat of Paris St Germain. Francois Modesto's goal early in the second half briefly brought Bastia back to 2-1, but their opponents were too strong. Crucially for Lyon, the win opened up a five-point lead over sixth-placed Marseille in the race for the final Europa League spot. Both sides went close inside the first 10 minutes as they looked to gain the upper hand, but Gianni Bruno's speculative 30-yard effort for Bastia ended up wide of the post before Henri Bedimo flashed a volley off target after Mickael Landreau punched a clearance directly at him. With just a quarter of an hour played Lyon opened the scoring to set the tone for the afternoon when Gomis sent a clinical header beyond Landreau from Bedimo's pinpoint cross. They almost doubled their lead moments later but Lacazette saw his goal-bound effort blocked by Sambou Yatabare's superb sliding challenge with Landreau beaten. The hosts did not have to wait long for a second, though, as Landreau's clearance from Gomis' delivery dropped at the feet of Fekir and he fired through a crowd of players to grab his first Ligue 1 goal. At the other end Bruno volleyed over Anthony Lopes' bar after meeting Florian Raspentino's teasing cross, but Maxime Gonalons wasted a decent opportunity for a third Lyon goal just before the interval. Bastia threatened a comeback just five minutes into the second half when Lyon failed to clear a corner and Modesto saw his shot beat Lopes with help of a large Bruno deflection. However, Corsican hopes were dashed four minutes later when Kone met a corner and thundered a header beyond Landreau. Bruno wasted another opportunity to close the gap when he headed over from two yards before Lacazette completed a fantastic afternoon for the hosts on 64 minutes. Fekir was the orchestrator with a fine run into the area before picking out Lacazette to coolly finish from 18 yards.