Pierre Sage’s team have surprisingly been Paris Saint-Germain’s (PSG) closest challengers in France this season, but they were swept aside by an in-form Lille.

Hakon Haraldsson turned in Matias Fernandez-Pardo’s clever pass just before half-time at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy.

Felix Correia pounced on a stray back-pass from Matthieu Udol to score a second for Lille five minutes after the break.

Fernandez-Pardo sealed a fifth win in six games for Lille from the penalty spot after a handball by Ismaelo Ganiou.

“You can lose but not in the way we did in a game like this. Now we have a duty to react,” Sage told broadcaster Ligue 1+.

“We didn’t turn up. It’s as if we were looking at ourselves in the mirror and seeing a different version of us,” Sage said.

Lille climbed up two places to third after extending their unbeaten run to eight matches, with Lens still four points behind PSG and having played a game more than the league leaders, who brushed past Toulouse 3-1 on Friday.

Strasbourg beat Nice 3-1 despite losing Argentina striker Joaquin Panichelli, the league’s joint leading goalscorer, to a long-term knee injury suffered while on international duty last week.

Martial Godo, Julio Enciso and Samir El Mourabet all struck in the first half for Strasbourg before Antoine Mendy bagged a late consolation for Nice.

Esteban Lepaul joined Panichelli on 16 goals for the season as he converted a pair of penalties to lift Rennes to a 4-3 win at Brest.

Swiss forward Breel Embolo also scored as Rennes moved up to sixth after inflicting a third straight loss on mid-table Brest.