I’ll leave you with Paul Doyle’s match report on a bad night for Arsenal. Bye!
Arsenal will back themselves to turn it around next week, but it’s worth remembering Alexandre Lacazette will still be suspended. They’ll need more from Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
Chelsea are about to take on Dynamo Kiev at Stamford Bridge. You can follow that match with Ben Fisher.
A famous win for Rennes, who were very good after getting over Alex Iwobi’s early goal, but a night to forget for Arsenal. They were cruising after Iwobi’s opener and missed chances to extend their lead, but they completely lost the run of themselves after Sokratis’s stupid red card. The Greek defender’s dismissal handed Rennes the initiative and the French side took full advantage, scoring three times to set up a 3-1 aggregate lead before they head to the Emirates for next Thursday’s second leg. Arsenal have it all to do and they can’t take anything for granted after this awful performance. Unai Emery is going to be a very unhappy man.
Full-time: Rennes 3-1 Arsenal
A huge roar greets the final whistle!
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90 min+3: This all feels so unnecessary. Arsenal were in control of this game! And then Sokratis decided to be weird.
90 min: There will be four minutes of stoppage time. Rennes make a change, Gelin on for Grenier.
An Arsenal throw deep on the left. They give the ball away and Rennes storm up field, breaking down the left. Silicki, the substitute sends a wonderful cross towards the far post and the unmarked Sarr is there to power a header past Cech and give the hosts a two-goal lead!
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GOAL! Rennes 3-1 Arsenal (Sarr, 88 min)
Sarr has the goal his performance deserves! This is a disaster for Arsenal!
86 min: Zeffane’s booked for chopping Guendouzi down. “So Arsenal didn’t make it to Big Cup this year but still manage to go out of Europe during the round of Arsenal,” Robin Hazlehurst says. “It is quite poetic really.”
83 min: There’s a sense Arsenal are trying to keep it at 2-1. This wouldn’t be the worst result for them to take back to the Emirates, even if losing to a mid-table French side isn’t a good look.
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80 min: Xhaka is living dangerously, fouling Siliki on the left. He’s already on a booking. He needs to cool it.
79 min: Arsenal make their final change, Sead Kolasinac replacing Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, who hasn’t been great. Aubameyang is a picture of frustration as he takes his seat on the bench. Arsenal don’t have a recognised striker on the pitch now.
77 min: Sarr gets the ball out of his feet on the right and flashes in a low ball towards the near post. Hunou attacksit, but Cech gathers.
74 min: Arsenal probe on the left. Monreal twists and turns and sees his shot deflected wide. He appeals for a penalty for handball, but settles for a corner.
73 min: James Lea Siliki replaces Benjamin Bourigeaud, who scored that magnificent Rennes equaliser.
70 min: Arsenal’s second change sees Aaron Ramsey replace Mesut Ozil, who surely won’t be starting against Manchester United on Sunday. “Apart from anything else - and there’s plenty- it’s the staggering levels of stupidity of some of the Arsenal players that is the notable feature of all this,” Charles Antaki says. “That and ineptitude. But mostly stupidity.”
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69 min: An awful clearance from Mustafi almost leads to a third goal for Rennes. Ben Arfa dips on to his left foot and aims for the left corner from 20 yards, but Cech flings himself across to tip wide! That’s a fantastic save.
68 min: Arsenal construct a rare attack. Xhaka threads a pass through to Ozil, who moves the ball on to his right foot, only to scoop a shot straight at Koubek!
67 min: Bensebaini drives into the Arsenal from the left, but he’s off balance as he shoots wide.
Rennes have the lead their dominance deserves! They won’t care there’s a huge element of fortune to this goal. They’ve been pressing so much and another attack sees Bensebaini slash a low shot off target from 20 yards. It’s a dismal effort, but Zeffane chases down a lost cause and collects possession near the right byline. His cross into the middle’s dangerous and it loops past Cech after taking a deflection off Monreal!
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GOAL! Rennes 2-1 Arsenal (Monreal own goal, 65 min)
It’s been coming!
64 min: Ben Arfa scoots round poor old Mkhitaryan, a fish out of water at right-back, but the Rennes schemer’s low ball evades Hunou. Grenier has a pop. It almost reaches Hunou, but he can’t control it.
62 min: Ben Arfa whips the free-kick over the wall, forcing Cech to push the ball over the bar for a Rennes corner. The hosts are pushing, but Aubameyang heads away.
61 min: Ben Arfa ghosts past Xhaka, who brings him down just outside the D. He’s booked.
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60 min: Sarr makes a nuisance of himself with another run. This time Koscienly steps across to challenge the winger, who goes down under minimal contact. No penalty.
Photograph: Loïc Venance/AFP/Getty Images
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59 min: Bourigeaud cuts inside from the left and tries to bend one towards the far corner from 20 yards. Cech dives to his left to make an awkward save, but Rennes keep attacking. The ball comes to Sarr, who raps one goalwards, forcing Cech to parry wide. The corner comes to nothing.
56 min: Arsenal can’t handle Sarr’s raids on the right. He storms past Monreal again, tearing towards the byline, leaving Arsenal all at sea. Somehow his cutback stays out after hitting Koscielny in the six-yard box. Arsenal are begging to concede here. “I hope Petr Cech has a better night at the office than his fellow wizened keeper Gianluigi Buffon had yesterday,” Peter Oh says. “I haven’t cared for the clubs Cech has played for, but he is a classy keeper and he will be missed after he hangs up his gloves at the end of the season.”
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53 min: Alex Iwobi, Arsenal’s goalscorer, makes way for Matteo Guendouzi. Iwobi looks a little baffled. He’s been Arsenal’s best attacking player.
52 min: Grenier’s free-kick is poor. Cech collects it easily.
51 min: Ben Arfa causes more problems, scooting inside from the right, and all Monreal can do is bring him down. Another Rennes free-kick. They’ll probably cross this one.
50 min: Sarr steams past Monreal and into the wide green spaces down the right. Arsenal are in trouble again. Sarr cuts the ball back and Bourigeaud runs on to it, only to shoot straight at Cech. Emery is going to bring on Guendouzi soon.
49 min: Bourigeaud cuts inside from the left and whips a cross into the middle. It bounces past the far post.
48 min: Zeffane breaks into space on the right, but his cross is overhit.
46 min: Arsenal get the second half underway. Unai Emery hasn’t made any changes, so Henrikh Mkhitaryan is still playing at right-back. That’s an area Rennes will need to exploit.
Sokratis made three fouls in a very short space of time and all of them could have been bookable offences. What was going through the Arsenal defender’s mind? He’s an experienced player and must have known he was walking a tightrope after the first yellow card. And still he made that challenge on Sarr.
Half-time: Rennes 1-1 Arsenal
A strange half draws to a close. Arsenal dominated for 30 minutes and should have added to Alex Iwobi’s early opener. Instead they lost their flow, had Sokratis Papastathopoulos sent off for two bookings and immediately conceded an equaliser. Rennes will fancy themselves now.
45 min+1: There will be three added minutes.
45 min: With Mkhitarayan playing as a makeshift right-back now that Mustafi has moved into the middle, Arsenal are rocking. Rennes attack down the left again, Bensebaini making it to the byline after beating Mkhitaryan, but Sarr sidefoots the left-back’s cross wide from close range! That was an excellent chance!
44 min: The 10 men of Arsenal threaten straight away, Ozil finding space on the left and picking out Aubameyang. The striker can’t turn and shoot, though, and the move ends with Mkhitaryan firing over from 20 yards.
The free-kick, given away by Sokratis, is to the left of the D. It’s around 20 yards yet. Bourigeaud spanks his first effort into the wall. Disappointing. Underwhelming. But the ball comes back to him - so he absolutely larrumps an astonishing effort towards the top-left corner with his right foot. There’s no way Cech’s saving that! The ball soars into the net and the Rennes fans erupt! What a goal!
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GOAL! Rennes 1-1 Arsenal (Bourigeaud, 42 min)
What a goal! And what a disastrous few minutes for Arsenal!
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Red card for Sokratis (Arsenal)
40 min: With Rennes building up a head of steam, the increasingly influential Ben Arfa slides Sarr through on the left. In steams Sokratis, already on a booking, and the Greek defender takes the Rennes forward out with a ridiculous barge just outside the Arsenal area! The referee has no option but to show Sokratis a second yellow and Arsenal are down to 10 men!
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39 min: Ben Arfa livens Rennes up with a wonderful jig into the area from the right, but he decides to faff around when he has space to shoot with his right foot, and the chance is lost after the forward tries one more twist.
38 min: Bourigeaud picks up a booking for fouling Torreira.
35 min: Hunou shoots over from the edge of the area.
34 min: Ben Arfa steps up to the free-kick. It’s 25 yards from goal, to the right of the D. He whips it low around the wall and it bounces just in front of Cech, who has to push it away.
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33 min: Xhaka gives possession away just inside Arsenal’s half, setting Ben Arfa on a run. He dips inside and gets taken out by Sokratis, who’s booked.
30 min: Arsenal win a free-kick on the left and work it brilliantly, taking it short and carving Rennes open with a quick passing sequence. Monreal pulls the ball back from the byline and the left-back’s cross reaches Arsenal’s right-back. Mustafi, seemingly no longer inconvenienced by that hip injury, takes a touch to set himself, only to slash just wide of the far post. Arsenal should be two or three goals to the good.
27 min: Sokratis bumps into Hunou on the right, kneeing the Rennes striker. He’s warned by the Slovakian referee.
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26 min: Mustafi is soldiering on. Maybe he reckons he can deal with Rennes, who aren’t offering much, a few bursts from Ben Arfa aside.
23 min: These are the kind of opponents Ozil loves tormenting. Rennes are giving the German too much time to look up and pick his passes, the latest of which sends Iwobi tearing through on the left. Iwobi tries to find Aubameyang at the far post, but Koublek punches clear. I suspect Arsenal will score again before the break.
22 min: With smoke billowing across the pitch, play resumes. Mustafi is trying to continue.
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20 min: Mustafi has gone down again. His evening may well be over as a consequence of that sore hip.
18 min: At least the Rennes fans are enjoying themselves - they’ve let off a couple of flares behind their side’s goal. Arsenal keep attacking and Aubameyang has a dig from 18 yards. Koublek gets down to make the save.
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16 min: Back on the pitch after receiving treatment on his hip, Mustafi concedes another free-kick, this time over on the left. Koscielny heads Ben Arfa’s cross away. Grenier’s riposte from 20 yards goes wide.
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14 min: Grenier steps up to the free-kick and spanks it a few yards over. A waste. He was too far out to score.
13 min: Mustafi is down after a collision with Ben Arfa midway inside the Arsenal half. He looks to be in some pain. The last thing Emery needs is another defensive injury. It won’t help Mustafi’s mood to see Rennes awarded a free-kick 30 yards from goal.
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12 min: I take it back: this might be very easy for Arsenal. They’re looking good. Ozil spreads it out wide again to Iwobi. He has too much space to slide a cross into the middle. They’re queuing up. Torreira arrives and sidefoots powerfully towards goal from 12 yards, but Koubek keeps the hosts in it with a fine save, parrying to safety!
9 min: In other news...
Confirmed: Uefa opens formal investigation into Manchester City for alleged FFP violations …
— Guardian sport (@guardian_sport) March 7, 2019
8 min: Arsenal are in the mood. Iwobi, his confidence up after that goal, scoots through the middle and slips a pass through to Aubameyang on the counter. The striker’s touch buys him a yard of space, but the ball’s whipped off his toes by Zeffane, who needed to make that challenge.
5 min: That really was an awful one for Rennes to concede. It was good play from Iwobi, but someone should have dealt with the Arsenal midfielder’s cross.
Granit Xhaka spreads the play out to Monreal on the left. The left-back finds Iwobi, who turns and beats his man too easily before looking to send a cross towards the far post. He manages better than that, though. His curling low ball deceives the Rennes defenders and, with Koubek slow to react, it ends up creeping inside the bottom left post to give Arsenal the perfect start! A goal out of nothing, so very soft, so very avoidable, but Unai Emery won’t care!
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GOAL! Rennes 0-1 Arsenal (Iwobi, 4 min)
Arsenal silence the crowd!
2 min: Rennes have tried to make a fast start. You sense this won’t be easy for Arsenal, whose first task might be to silence the crowd.
Peep! Rennes, in red shirts and black shorts, get the game underway in a terrific atmosphere. They’re kicking from left to right in the first half. Arsenal, wearing their light blue away strip, will need to have their wits about them.
Here come the teams! We’ll get the Europa League out the way and then this last-16 tie can begin!
Unai Emery speaks! “We need every player and we have a lot of matches. We are finding fresh players and energy, but it’s not only the first 11. The players on the bench are very important. Hatem Ben Arfa is playing very well. His motivation is very good. But for us it is the same. I expect respect to them, to him, they have a lot of good players. We have prepared to stop them and him.”
It could be an evening to focus on mercurial, brilliant, fragile creators. Up front for Rennes is Hatem Ben Arfa, formerly of Newcastle and not exactly best friends with Unai Emery at PSG, while Mesut Ozil starts only his sixth away game of the season for Arsenal. It’s the first time the German’s started away from the Emirates since the 1-1 draw at Brighton on Boxing Day and he could do with making a strong statement before Arsenal host Manchester United on Sunday.
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Pre-match reading
Team news
Rennes: Koubek; Zeffane, Da Silva, Mexer, Bensebaini; Bourigeaud, Andre, Grenier, Sarr; Hunou, Ben Arfa. Subs: Badiashile, Doumbia, Johansson, Siliki, Lauriente, Del Castillo, Gelin.
Arsenal: Cech; Mustafi, Koscielny, Sokratis, Monreal; Torreira, Xhaka; Mkhitaryan, Ozil, Iwobi; Aubameyang. Subs: Leno, Kolasinac, Maitland-Niles, Guendouzi, Suarez, Ramsey, Nketiah.
Referee: Ivan Kruzliak (Slovakia)
Preamble
Hello. There have been times this season when there has been a sense of something proper happening with Unai Emery’s Arsenal. Though they remain a long way from perfect, there have been flashes of an actual grown-up team emerging, which would be something indeed. They were pretty decent in last weekend’s 1-1 away draw with Tottenham, for example, and this is a squad that contains enough talent for Emery to lay down some promising foundations as he gets to grip with the post-Wenger rebuild.
But plenty of ifs and buts and uncertainties remain. Nobody is quite sure of how good Arsenal are at the moment – home wins over Chelsea and Spurs were ones to savour, but an FA Cup defeat to Manchester United felt all too familiar – and there can be no guarantee they’ll regain their place in the Champions League place after two years away from Europe’s top competition. Their inconsistent league form makes it hard to predict a top-four finish with any confidence.
That makes these Thursday night excursions all the more important, even if it must dent their pride to be taking on the 10th best team in France the day after United’s stunning win against PSG. They can’t be sniffy about the Europa League. It could be their best chance of qualifying for the Champions League and Emery, who won this competition with Sevilla three times, will not be taking Rennes lightly. Arsenal had a scare in the previous round against Bate Borisov, losing the first leg in Belarus before putting things right at the Emirates Stadium, and they’ll need their game faces on against opponents who looked nifty while knocking out Real Betis.
Kick-off: 5.55pm GMT, 6.55pm in Rennes.
