Twente ease into next round

Thursday 02 October 2008

FC Twente beat Stade Rennes 1-0 tonight and that was precisely enough to erase the 2-1 defeat of the first leg.

It meant Twente were the third club to qualify for the group stages of the UEFA Cup.

The 2-1 defeat in France was of course a pretty good starting position, but with Twente's difficulties to score this season Rennes will certainly have come to Enschede full of confidence.

And indeed Steve McClaren's men encountered opposition that was a lot tougher than expected.

They were even lucky to not be 1-0 down at half-time as referee Anton Genov after 24 minutes disallowed a French goal for disputable reasons.

Twente had trouble finding any holes in the tight French defense.

The current numbers 10 of French league played very compact and the defense led by former Heerenveen player Petter Hansson gave away very little.

Twente came close to a goal only once when Douchez gave away a rebound on an Elia shot.

Bu the Rennes keeper got on his feet just in time to keep Blaise N'Kufo from opening the score.

Only after the break did Twente create any chances from their preponderance.

The biggest one was for Blaise N'Kufo who was allowed to head a low Elia cross into an empty goal.

But to the dismay of all of Enschede the Swiss striker headed the ball too high.

A few minutes later N'Kufo made up for his earlier failure.

After a quickly taken free kick the striker evaded the off side trap and put Twente ahead.

The goal was enough for Twente to secure the tie and qualify for the next round.