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| Rennes go top |
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Victor Montano's second-half penalty saw Rennes go top of the Ligue 1 table with victory over struggling Monaco.
The Brittany outfit have been one of the surprise packages of a congested title fight and Montano's spot-kick, following a handball by Nampalys Mendy, saw them pick up their seventh win of the campaign.
This defeat leaves Guy Lacombe's visitors with just one win from their past 10 games and they remain just above the drop zone on goal difference.
Monaco enjoyed the better of the first half and could have taken a fourth-minute lead as Adriano unleashed a fierce shot that just cleared the crossbar.
Nicolas Douchez in the Rennes goal needed to be at full strength to deny a powerful effort from Lukman Haruna before Laurent Bonnart's cross picked out Park Chu-young, but the Korean volleyed wide of the target.
Park was guilty of a terrible miss at the start of the second half as Chris Malonga's pass found him unmarked at the far post, but he somehow managed to miss the target.
Rennes had their best chance in the 57th minute as Jires Kembo-Ekoko saw his effort deflected wide before they took the lead seven minutes later.
Mendy was adjudged to have handled in the area and Montano made no mistake as he fired his spot-kick down the middle as Stephane Ruffier dived to his right.
Jerome Leroy could have sealed the points with 10 minutes remaining but Ruffier produced a fantastic save to deny him, before Douchez denied Monaco's late rally by slapping away Serge Gapke's attempted lob.
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