Sturm Graz and Rennes Play to Scoreless Draw in VAR-Heavy Europa League Clash

Two disallowed goals five minutes apart, and a scoreline that finished 0-0. Stadion Graz-Liebenau hosted a draw between SK Puntigamer Sturm Graz and Rennes in the Europa League, a result that in the end came down to what VAR took away from both sides in the first half.

Rennes started on the front foot and thought they'd broken the deadlock in the 7th minute through Adrien Thomasson, after a shot from Anthony Rouault and another from Esteban Lepaul that the Austrian defense couldn't fully clear. The VAR review, confirmed a minute later, wiped out the goal and kept the score level. The psychological blow didn't seem to faze the French side, who kept driving forward with Lepaul and Ludovic Blas causing steady trouble from inside the box.

Sturm Graz answered with their own fleeting moment of joy: in the 33rd minute, Paul-Friedrich Koller put the ball in the net following a play from Joshua Quarshie, but an offside call in the buildup canceled it out, confirmed by VAR two minutes later. It was the home side's only clear flash in a first half territorially dominated by Rennes, who racked up clear chances without converting any of them.

A Second Half of Pressure Without Reward

The second half followed the same script: Rennes with the ball, firing shots from every angle, and Sturm Graz holding firm as Luca Weinhandl, Jacob Hodl and Belmin Beganovic tried their luck in isolated moments. The post denied Mahdi Camara a goal in the 73rd minute, off an assist from Arnaud Nordin, in the visitors' clearest chance of the second half. With both benches already having made their substitutions, including Boulaye Dia coming on for Lepaul, the game lost some intensity but not effort: Sturm Graz pushed for a winner in stoppage time with shots from Simon Seidl, Paul-Friedrich Koller and Filip Rozga, but none found the target.

The numbers make the gap in control clear, even if not in end product:

Rennes had nearly double the shots and more than double the possession, a gap that shows up in our own estimate of xG generated in the match: 2.079 for the visitors against 0.703 for Sturm Graz. It's a measure of what was created over the 90 minutes rather than a prediction, but it confirms the draw was held up more by Austrian resistance and refereeing decisions than by an evenly matched contest in terms of chances.

Before kickoff, our projection gave Sturm Graz a 47% chance of winning, 27% for a draw and 26% for Rennes, with expected goals of 1.7 for the home side and 1.22 for the visitors. What played out on the field was the opposite of what we anticipated on the scoreboard: neither side scored, and it was Rennes, the team we gave fewer odds of winning, that controlled the game from start to finish without turning it into a result.

The point split leaves both clubs with a draw on their Europa League league-phase record, in a standings table where results still carry little weight since most teams have played just one match so far. For Sturm Graz, the point feels almost like a win after weathering Rennes' offensive siege; for the French side, there's the lingering sense that the disallowed goal early on and Camara's post could have changed a story that ended goalless despite 23 shots at the opposing net.