The French Ligue will definitly be closer this year than last year. With the two obvious teams fighting it out-lyon and marseille and there will be a real suprise packet who will be at the top-don't have a clue who. Lyon with a new coach and losing Abidal, Tiago, Malouda and Carew (probably their best players over the past seasons) will struggle. Lyon have picked up grosso, bodmer and keita. So their losses probly out weigh the gains. Whereas Marseille have bought more and bought better players, that outwiegh there few losses.
You can never right off Lyon, they still have a quality team all round. With Coupet strong at the back, Juninho creating the chances and his great free-kicks and with the likes of govou, baros, fred, wiltord and grosso they can win the title again this year. But each year it gets harder to win back-to-back titles and with 5 in a row, i think its marseille's turn to win this year.