Rennes VS Larnaca

Rennes welcome Larnaca for this UEFA Europa League round 6 battle at Estádio Roazhon Park early Friday morning Beijing time. The hosts are a French team and Larnaca come from the small island of Cyprus. This is the last round and the situation is very clear here: Only Rennes have something to play for in terms of qualifying for the 1/8-finals. Larnaca will finish in the 3rd place and continue their campaign in the Conference League Play Offs. The hosts have taken 11 points so far and occupy the 2nd place – This is the same number as the Turkish team, Fenerbahce here. Rennes's goal difference is 10:6.They will probably have to win this much to keep their hopes of toppling Fenerbache alive as the Turks are likely to beat Dynamo Kiev. I think the hosts will be very aggressive here and clearly control the match right from the kickoff My fans and I would need them to win by at least two goals' difference and the chance for this is close to 80%. They have not lost a single hame in this group so far.

Larnaca, on the other hand, have been very bad so far and have managed to take point only from Dinamo Kyiv – a pretty weak team at the moment. They also have a bad score difference – 6:9. They are clearly not good enough to really compete at at this level. They have also been disappointing in their domestic league, Cyprus First Division and are currently in the 4th place with 16 points. Paphos, who top the standings, have grabbed 23 points so far. They did beat a pretty weak team, Karmiotissa, in their most recent match at 4-0 at home though but the much was much more balanced than the final score suggests. The ball possession was just 54-46% in the hosts favor and the visitors also recorded over 10 scoring chances.

We must realize that the French Ligue 1 is massively better than First Division. Rennes have done very well so far and are in third place with 27 points. Their score difference is also very good - 28:12. Rennes beat Larnaca in the first round in Cyprus 2-1.The difference in all areas of the game became very clear indeed in this match! Especially offensively Rennes's players were much better – more skilled, faster and creative. Larnaca only recorded two shots on Rennes's goal whilst Braga recorded seven and also had 17 goal attempts. Rennes played quite well in Turkey in the last round taking a 3-3 draw at stadium where Fenerbache are usually very strong! The hosts will miss Omari and Santamaria today. They visitors will have to compete without Altman, Asante, Casado, Faraj, Gama, Paraskevas, Romo, Samjurjo and Trickovski. A very long list indeed..