Upon the recent appointment of Julien Stéphan for his second stint as Rennes boss, the club’s technical director Florian Maurice, whose project with the Brittany-based side we recently analysed in detail here at Total Football Analysis, openly admitted to RMC Sport that a Rennes return for Stéphan was not his “first choice”, indicating that the club’s move for the 43-year-old was born more out of a need to just get somebody into the position following Bruno Génésio’s abrupt departure.
Several managers spring to mind who could’ve been preferred options for Les Rouge et Noirs, including the likes of Will Still of Reims, who could see a move to Rennes as a step up in terms of prestige.
However, with that said, it might have been impossible to take the promising young coach away from his Reims project at present in favour of a floundering Rennes.
Rennes’ squad value as of 11th September, per CIES Football Observatory, was €209m — the third-highest in Ligue 1 behind only PSG and Monaco.
However, they currently sit a lowly 13th on the table, having won just two of their first 12 games this term.
It would be an understatement to say they’ve failed to live up to expectations and deliver according to the quality of their squad.
Still, taking over a squad with such quality and getting them back on track would be an attractive prospect for many coaches in Europe’s top-five leagues (or ‘Tier 1’ clubs, according to our tier list) as well as the vast majority of coaches currently working at ‘Tier 2’ clubs (our ‘Tier 2’ leagues are as follows: EFL Championship, Russian Premier League, Liga Portugal, Turkish Süper Lig, Argentine Primera División, Campeonato Brasileiro Série A, Belgian Pro League and Dutch Eredivisie).
This tactical analysis and head coach-focused scout report will highlight three top managers currently working in one of those leagues who may be of interest to the next ‘Rennes-level’ club in need of a new head coach.
Each of these coaches has demonstrated excellent ability in their current role, which may warrant the attention of clubs that could offer them even greater resources to compete at the highest possible level.
We’ll provide some analysis of each manager’s tactics in and out of possession with their respective clubs at the moment to highlight how they’ve got their teams performing at such a high standard.
Javier Gandolfi Tactics At Club Atlético Talleres 42 Years Old
First up for us is 42-year-old Javier Gandolfi from Argentina’s CA Talleres.
Gandolfi guided his side to a second-place finish in the Argentinian league this season before having a slightly less impressive run in the Copa de la Liga Profesional campaign that directly followed in the second half of their season.
Overall, however, Talleres certainly put together some impressive performances this year, and Gandolfis job was largely positive.
Gandolfi’s Talleres side primarily stood out from an attacking standpoint this year, scoring the second-most goals (54) and accumulating the third-highest xG (54.5) of any team over the two separate phases of the Argentinian season.
Talleres also attempted the third-most shots per 90 (11.64).
They tallied up the third-most touches inside the opposition’s penalty area (15.33), two further vital indicators of their success in getting forward and putting the ball in good goalscoring positions regularly.
Gandolfi has primarily lined his team up in a 4-2-3-1 shape this season; they tend to try and play out from the back through the backline, who will look to quickly get play moving upfield with progressive passes towards the attacking midfielders, wingers, and centre-forward.
Talleres require aggressiveness, risk-taking, and a penetrative nature from those deep-lying players in the build-up and ball progression phases.
Once in the final third, the playmakers must continue to display the bravery and technical quality that have helped Talleres generate numerous goal-scoring opportunities this term.
A couple of key players have helped significantly with this, the first of whom is 24-year-old Ramón Sosa, a crucial creator and goalscorer for his team in 2023.
Fearless ball-
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