Season 1965/1966

Freshly-crowned as winners of their first French Cup Final, and on the back of a very good previous season, Stade Rennais began the new 1965/1966 season with an ambitious approach. The Red and Blacks would keep the backbone of the side, and strengthened their squad with the arrival of a batch of up-and-coming and talented local youngsters, with the likes of Floch, Rico and Garcia joining Rennes. Rennes made its first foray into European football, in the European Cup Winners Cup, but were unable to get over the hurdle of Czech sidem Dukla Prague (0-2 / 0-0) in spite of two heroic performances, The Red and Blacks played their season opener in the curtain-raiser Champions Trophy against local rivals, Nantes, but lost out 2-4. Revenge was sweet, however, as Rennes became the first team to defeat Nantes in the league that season two months later. The start of the season would prove to be less than great for Rennes, though, suffering five defeats in their opening nine league fixtures. They would spend the majority of the season floating in mid-table between 12th and 16th places, and had to wait until March to experience their first away win of the season. The team finally awoke from its slumber in the final 14 league matches of the season, climbing back up the table to finish with a flourish in 6th place, with the 4th-best attack, and 17th-rated defence. Rodighiero was Rennes' top-scorer for the season with
20 goals, a tally which put him 7th in the leading goalscorer charts. In the French Cup, Rennes were unable to repeat their exploit of the previous year, knocked out in the Round of 16 by Reims, who were plying their trade in the Second Division at the time.