Scottish Premiership champions Celtic grabbed a 1-1 draw away at Ligue 1 outfit Rennes in the Europa League group stage.
Celtic fought back for a creditable point away at Rennes in their Europa League opener on Thursday night and, speaking to L’Equipe, the Ligue 1 side’s head coach Julien Stephan was left to rue a failure to kill the game off before Ryan Christie’s equaliser.
Rennes were gifted a lead just before half-time by the most ridiculous of Kristoffer Ajer lunges inside the penalty area and Mbaye Niang, the star man now since Ismaila Sarr left for Watford, converted with class from 12 yards.
But Celtic were handed a penalty of their own midway through the second half and, after James Forrest went to ground, Christie made no mistake with his tenth goal of the season already.
Yet Stephan, who led Rennes to the Europa League round of 16 last season, clearly feels like his side threw away the chance to seal three points before a strong finish from the visitors.
“We were facing an experienced adversary, but we did not open enough spaces and we gave them the opportunity to come back,” said the manager who guided Rennes to their first trophy since 1983 last season.
“The victory of Cluj (against Lazio) confirms what we already knew; we must hang on to take a maximum of points. We will see at the end if it is a point won this evening, or two points lost.”
For Celtic, this is most definitely a point gained. But with Serie A giants Lazio to come as well as a Cluj side who won 4-3 at Parkhead as recently as August, there is a lot of football still to be played.
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