Jorge Sampaoli’s negative tactics are not working at Rennes

There has been a trend towards younger, or at least more progressive, managers in France of late, and largely to good effect. The football played by Will Still, Luka Elsner and Liam Rosenior is innovative, modern and genuinely thrilling to watch. Older managers are also making their mark. Franck Haise is doing much the same at Nice as he did at Lens, and more recent arrivals Adi Hütter and Roberto De Zerbi have Monaco and Marseille playing some fine football as well.

Antoine Kombouaré and Jean-Louis Gasset are still stalking the sidelines at Nantes and Montpellier, respectively, but the era of apoplectic warhorse tracksuit managers seems to be well and truly gone in France. René Girard, Frédéric Antonetti, Michel der Zakarian are all out of a job in the top flight, and Olivier Dall’Oglio’s departure from Saint-Étienne seems to be working well for the club, who have looked far more cohesive under Eirik Horneland.

The elephant in the room is Jorge Sampaoli at Rennes. The former Argentina, Chile, Sevilla, Marseille and Flamengo manager replaced Julien Stéphan in November when the club had dropped too 13th in the table. After another defeat at the weekend, they are down to 16th.

This comes despite a significant outlay on transfers in the summer — the club signed no fewer than nine first-team players at a cost of €80m, and they have spent another €35m this month on Séko Fofana and Brice Samba. Granted, there have been a raft of key exits – namely Martin Terrier, Désiré Doué and Benjamin Bourigeaud – but proven players such as Glen Kamara and Hans Hateboer have arrived to replace them.

The cupboard was also hardly bare. Ludovic Blas, Arnaud Kalimuendo and Amine Gouiri are a more-than-creditable attacking trio; Adrien Truffert is one of the league’s best young full-backs; and Azor Matusiwa is a strong presence in central midfield. But after their 3-2 defeat in Monaco on Saturday – a scoreline that flatters the visitor – they have lost five straight games in all competitions, including an elimination from the Coupe de France at the hands of second-tier strugglers Troyes.

Since Sampaoli’s appointment, the team have won just twice in the league, only beating fellow relegation strugglers Angers and Saint-Étienne (who finished with 10 men) in that spell. They occupy the relegation playoff spot, despite the top-drawer arrivals of Fofana and Samba, both proven performers in the league who have been among the best in their positions in previous seasons.

Fofana was unstinting in his criticism of the manager on Saturday, offering this frank assessment: “If I were the manager, there are certain choices I would make that would be different. But the coach has his ideas and he’s also doing what he can with the players he has. We tried things in training this week: some that worked, others that didn’t work so well.”

Fofana complained that the team is “always reactive”, adding to the chorus of fans who feel his tactics are too negative. Much of Sampaoli’s greatest success, both with Chile and with Marseille, came by playing a 4-3-3 – a formation that would work with this Rennes squad – but he has remained strongly hewn to a 5-4-1.

Without proper wing-backs or a physical No9 who can lead the line on his own, the attack is disjointed and the defence is sloppy. When asked about the drawbacks of his chosen formation, his answer was far more defensive than his team’s play, as he parried vaguely by offering a non-answer: “Philosophy depends on the ability of the players available, and what we are trying to do with this squad, is to have a system that allows you to have a certain order. We have a hard time getting the ball back and playing with the ball, we’re working a lot on this.”

They will need to work quickly. Rennes face Strasbourg, who are going from strength to strength, next weekend, before taking on Lille, with PSG and Lens awaiting them in early March.

Sampaoli says he is hoping for more reinforcements in the window – the club has been linked with the Celtic forward Kyogo Furuhashi – but these decisions may not lie with the manager. His predecessor was sacked as the club thought their expensively assembled squad should be challenging for Europe. If Sampaoli fails to right the ship, failure to reach Europe could soon be replaced by failure to stay in the division.

Talking points

Slowly but surely, things are coming good for Paris Saint-Germain. They were unplayable in the second half of their crucial win over Manchester City on Wednesday and continue to look more and more like the real deal. Still unbeaten in Ligue 1, they have added another string to their bow with the arrival of Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, who marked his debut on Saturday with a mazy run and lovely one-two with Désiré Doué before teeing up Ousmane Dembélélé. With a fine left winger already in place in the form of Bradley Barcola, Luis Enrique says he will also use the Georgian through the middle, adding another tactical wrinkle and game-changing attacking option to his team. Whoever draws PSG in the next round of the Champions League will have to be wary.

What a season this is (slowly) becoming for Nice. After a resounding 2-0 win over Marseille on Sunday night in a scintillating display of well-executed counterattacking football, only PSG have picked up more points than Les Aiglons since the beginning of October. What Franck Haise has done with limited incomings in the summer is impressive enough in isolation, but that it’s been achieved with Terem Moffi and Morgan Sanson missing the entire season, and Jérémie Boga also spending a large spell on the sidelines, is outstanding. Nice may have sacrificed the Europa League, but, as we saw from Haise’s Lens sides, his needs-must approach is impressive.

Finally, while leaders PSG remain unbeaten 19 matches into the season, the second-longest streak has moved east after Strasbourg beat Lille 2-1 on Saturday, ending Les Dogues’ 14-match unbeaten run in Ligue 1 as they extended their own to six. Emanuel Emegha and Andrey Santos were both on the scoresheet, as Strasbourg moved to within three points of Lyon and Lens. The absence of their creative linchpin, Dilane Bakwa, is frustrating but Liam Rosenior’s side could yet snatch a European place given their depth and youthful energy.