Lyon regained the lead in the French first division with a 4-0 drubbing of Strasbourg on the day the Alsace club changed hands.

Sold off by Mark McCormack's sports marketing giant IMG, Strasbourg were never at the races against the reigning champions.

Brazilian Sonny Anderson's fourth minute effort opened the floodgates, with French international Eric Carriere, Democratic Republic of Congo's Peguy Luyindula and Philippe Violeau adding to the visitor's tally in the second half.

The runaway win put Lyon top with 64 points, two clear of Marseille who did their title ambitions no harm at all with a 2-1 win at Bastia with three matches remaining.

But Monaco, three points adrift, can displace Lyon at the summit if they beat Paris Saint Germain at the Parc des Princes on Sunday.

A win would leave Didier Deschamps' men level on points with Lyon but holding the advantage thanks to a superior goal difference.

Marseille's victory, which ended a two match losing run, came at a Sprice for defender Manuel dos antos, who fractured his left shin after a 28th minute collision with Bastia's Nicolas Penneteau which earned the Corsican keeper a red card.

With Bastia down to ten men and Ali Boumnijel stepping in to keep goal in place of Penneteau, Marseille had a golden opportunity

to run off with the three points.

And Alain Perrin's team duly took the lead on the stroke of halftime when Fabio Celestini fed Dmitri Sytchev who headed past Boumnijel.

After the break Marseille again dominated without any tangible results until Belgian defender Daniel Van Buyten put the game beyond doubt with four minutes left.

Bastia got a stoppage time consolation goal after Laurent Battles scored with a header.

Elsewhere Bordeaux trod water in fourth, five points adrift of Marseille, despite going down 1-0 away to Auxerre, the only goal of the encounter scored by Djibril Cisse.

That left Auxerre on 57 points, the same total as Bordeaux and fifth placed Sochaux, 2-0 winners at bottom club Troyes.

Second from bottom Ajaccio picked themselves up off the floor after last week's 6-1 thrashing by Bordeaux and at the same time gave themselves a glimmer of hope of staying in the top flight with a vital 1-0 victory over Le Havre.