Moses Simon and Nantes managed to retain their French Ligue 1 status and survive relegation despite losing 0-1 at home to French second tier side Toulouse on Sunday in the second leg of the relegation playoffs.
Nantes narrowly escaped the drop despite the home loss having won the first leg of the playoffs 2-1 away last week to eventually edge out Toulouse by the away goals rule with aggregate scores standing at 2-2.
In a tense and keenly contested game played at the Stade de la Beaujoire home ground of Nantes, Vakoun Issouf Bayo scored the only goal of the game in the 62nd minute assisted by Amine Adli.
The game witnessed eight bookings with Nantes accounting for three yellow cards while Toulouse had four with Nathan N’Goumou getting the matching orders in the 87th minute.
Simon started the game and featured on the left side of a 4-man midfield in a 4-4-2 formation adopted by coach Antoine Kombouare. The Nigerian international was on till the 83rd minute before he was replaced by Andrei Girollo.
It would be recalled that Simon also started the first leg and played for 79 minutes while bagging an assist in the 2-1 win last Thursday.
Following the result, Simon is set to feature in his third consecutive season in the French Ligue 1 come next season with Nantes.
Nantes had to go through the playoffs to retain their topflight status after initially finishing 18th on the table.
Simon played 36 times for Nantes this term. He scored six times and bagged six assists. Sunday’s game is the 66th game the Nigerian has played for Nantes since he joined in July 2000 from LaLiga Santander side, Levante UD.
By Sulaiman Alao