Without a fixed coach and clearly without a clear guideline for the coming months, Rennes hosts Toulouse this Sunday, November 10 for the 11th day of Ligue 1, with the sole objective of staying as far as possible from the red zone.
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The Breton club will host Toulouse at Roazhon Park this Sunday, without an official coach on the bench, following the sidelining of Julien Stéphan. On Friday, it was Sébastien Tambouret, usually in charge of the reserve, who presented himself to the press without formal assurance that he would still be in charge on Sunday.
Negotiations with Argentinian Jorge Sampaoli, former Argentina national team coach and Marseille coach, among others, appear to be about to conclude, but probably not soon enough for him to already be on the bench on Sunday. “We prepare as if we were there on Sunday“, replied Sébastien Tambouret at a press conference on this subject. “Today, we are on the short term, (a) somewhat emergency mission, with a match in two days. We know that in two days, we have to do things right“, he added.
This very unartistic vagueness now seems the trademark of a club which has completely lost its direction in recent months.
The cryptic sentences of Bruno Genesio, during his last weeks as coach, about the fact that not everyone was pulling in the same direction in the club, had put the flea in the ear.
The parachuting, almost a year ago to the day, of Julien Stéphan in his place, ordered directly by the owners, against the advice of president Olivier Cloarec and sports director Florian Maurice, with whom Stéphan had not gotten along since. his first visit, had added to the trouble.
If Maurice's departure in the summer could seem to comfort Stéphan, it turned out to be a Pyrrhic victory. Weakened by a failed end to the season, he found himself in an already precarious situation upon the arrival of Franco-Italian Frederic Massara as sports director.
After a flamboyant start against Lyon (3-0), the first difficulties and apparent tactical procrastination only degraded it further until the dismissal of Olivier Cloarec, replaced by Arnaud Pouille at the beginning of October, which placed him in first line and straight away from the error.
Ironically, the sidelining of Julien Stéphan came exactly seven years after the arrival in Rennes of Olivier Létang as executive president, following the dismissal of the pair René Ruello, president – Christian Gourcuff, coach. An arrival which marked the starting point of the golden age of the Reds and Blacks, punctuated by a victory in the Coupe de France and six consecutive European seasons, including one in the Champions League.
For the moment, there is nothing to really suggest that Rennes is on the verge of finding the magic formula. The coaches considered more or less seriously, Igor Tudor, Patrick Vieira, Rudi Garcia, Habib Beye, Niko Kovac, show that even the profile sought was not so clearly defined.
While waiting for this hunt for the rare pearl to succeed, and even if it took around ten days for the new coach to take charge, Rennes cannot afford to let the upcoming match slip away.
Thirteenth with a small point ahead of the red zone, they will host Toulouse who have finally launched their season since the last international break with a draw and two consecutive victories.
It will take much more than a burst of pride to put Rennes back on the trajectory of its European ambitions, but in the immediate future and in the face of urgency, if there is not even that on Sunday, the mission of the future coach will be almost impossible.
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