Lyon lost their one hundred percent record in controversial fashion at Roazhon Park with a 3-1 defeat to Rennes. Playing without a centre forward for the second game running, Les Gones dominated the first half and took the lead in the 14th minute. Corentin Tolisso, playing as a false nine, rose highest in the box to head home a Karabec cross.
A couple of minutes later Rennes defender Anthony Rouault escaped unpunished for a horror tackle on Lyon midfielder Khalis Merah that many onlookers thought merited a straight red card. Bizarrely the VAR officials didn’t ask referee Ruddy Buquet to take another look at it.
Fortunately Merah avoided serious injury and was able to continue. He was presented with a golden opportunity to double the advantage shortly before half time when he got in behind the Rennes defence and ran half the length of the pitch for a one-on-one with Rennes goalkeeper Brice Samba. The France international came off his line to save the initial effort, pushing the ball wide to the right from where Merah followed up with a second shot that Samba recovered to save again.
With 60% of the first half possession and four shots on target to zero for Rennes it was clear that Lyon were well on top at the interval and it seemed like only a matter of time until they wrapped up the game. They had another huge chance to do so in the 62nd minute when Karabec beat his man to open up a glorious shooting opportunity. It looked easier to score, but he somehow put his effort wide of the post.
Lyon were still seemingly coasting towards victory and a fourth consecutive clean sheet with a quarter of an hour left to play when everything began to unravel very quickly. Tyler Morton decided to take one for the team by tripping Rennes substitute Mohamed Kader Meïté to nip a counter attack in the bud. To universal astonishment his tactical foul was punished with a red card rather than the standard yellow and Lyon were reduced to ten men.
Rennes capitalised on their numerical advantage almost immediately with a goal from Rouault after a scramble in the Lyon box following a corner. There was a long VAR check to examine an apparent offside and potential foul on the goalkeeper, but the goal was eventually awarded to the player who probably shouldn’t still have been on the pitch.
The Rennes tails were up and they threw everything into the chase for a winner, which duly came in the third minute of injury time. Meïté took a shot from an acute angle which deflected into the net off Lyon goalkeeper Rémy Descamps. To rub salt into the wound, Meïté scored again two minutes later with a header to make it an improbable 3-1 home win.