Rennes left Auxerre with a commanding 4-1 scoreline, but the noise from the visitors’ dressing room at half-time told a different story. Franck Haise’s side had been level at the break after allowing Cameron Archer a route to goal that the coach felt should never have existed.
Quick facts
- Rennes defeated Auxerre 4-1 on Ligue 1 matchday six.
- Esteban Lepaul opened the scoring in the 15th minute.
- Cameron Archer equalised after breaking through from a long pass by his goalkeeper.
- Adrien Thomasson restored Rennes’ lead before Boulaye Dia scored twice in stoppage time.
- Rennes are third on 13 points, level with second-placed Lille and one point behind Monaco.
Haise admitted he had raised his voice sharply during the interval, with Rennes failing to match their early advantage with the required defensive concentration.
“You can probably hear it in my voice,” he said after the match. “It had been a while since I had gone that hard at half-time.”
The Rennes coach said he would prefer not to need such interventions regularly, joking that too many would bring an early end to his career. But he considered the response necessary.
A warning after the early lead
Lepaul had put Rennes ahead after 15 minutes, yet Auxerre struck back when Archer was sent clear from deep following a long ball delivered by his own goalkeeper.
Haise pointed to a sequence of collective defensive errors. Rennes had a three-against-one situation but did not apply preventive marking, he said, while the team also lacked aggression and made recovery runs short of full intensity.
Auxerre are particularly effective in that type of transition, Haise noted, and he believed the pattern of the first half could even have left Rennes behind at the interval.
The second half brought the reaction he wanted. Thomasson put Rennes back in front, before Dia’s two late goals turned a difficult evening into an emphatic win.
Haise said he was pleased by both the level shown after the restart and the character of his players. He would have preferred that urgency from the opening whistle, but accepted that every match develops differently.
Rennes stay in the leading group
The victory keeps Rennes firmly among the early pacesetters. They sit third, with the same 13-point total as Lille in second and only one point separating them from leaders Monaco.
For Haise, the key is that Rennes have accumulated points while still carrying room for improvement. He said it was better to be on 13 points with clear progress still to make than to be satisfied with the performances while sitting much lower in the table.
