FC Copenhagen took a huge step towards the Champions League group stages with a 1-0 victory at home over LOSC Lille from the French Ligue 1. César Santin gave the home side a much needed lead in the 38th minute on which he headed Copenhagen in front after some nifty play just outside the penalty area.

Lille, who recently started their Ligue 1 campaign, has only played two matches before the Copenhagen game which were showing especially in the final third of the pitch. Numerous passes without a recipient and shots fired without hitting the goal, showed that Lille needs some more match-play before they can really show off their true colors and live up to their nickname given by French press “the Barcelona of France”.

Needless to say both clubs have been rather busy in the transfer window. Both clubs have lost key figures on the pitch. Most noticeable is of course that Lille lost hyped winger and playmaker Eden Hazard to Chelsea for a hefty £32million and Copenhagen lost top scorer Dame N’Doye to Lokomotiv Moscow for £5.5million. But both got replaced with up-and-coming players such as Solomon Kalou from Chelsea to Lille and Nicolai Jorgensen from Leverkusen to Copenhagen. Especially Jorgensen showed his talent in the game by always get into the room between the defense and midfield. Kalou was very composed with the ball but without showing his real quality in this game, though to be said, when the two teams meet in France in about 7 days, this will indeed need to change as the French need a win if they want to be in the UEFA Champions League.

Claus Røndbjerg-Christensen

Twitter @DanishFooty