Camille Abily would have «liked to play for Stade Rennes»

Her name may only be vaguely familiar to most, yet she is a major figure in French football… Women’s football. Aged 26, Camille Abily has already earned a lot of major titles, several champion medals in France as well as in the USA, twice the best player in the League, sixty caps in the French national team, and a nomination among the best ten players in the world this year.

Born in Rennes, Camille Abily played for several years at Bruz, then at Le Rheu, before her career took off in Montpellier, Lyon, Paris and the United States in the professional league. Currently on a training camp in Saint-Malo with the Olympique Lyonnais, she expressed her regret to Ouest-France, not to have been able to play for her favourite club. “I would have loved to play for the Stade Rennais, she explains. I’ve been supporting the club since I was a little child”.

But there is no women team at Stade Rennes, to the contrary of several other French clubs such as Lyon, Paris Saint-Germain, Montpellier, Le Mans, Saint-Étienne or Toulouse. In Brittany, only Saint-Brieuc plays in the top flight, with Rennes’ women football represented by CPB Bréquigny (D2). “I think it’s a shame that there isn’t another Breton club alongside Saint Brieuc in D1, regrets Patrice Lair, the OL Manager. The Stade Rennais should have one. The investment is not that important, with one million euros you could do something good”.

The idea deserves to be given some attention. At the moment, two Breton women are playing in the French national team, Camille Abily and Morbihan’s Eugénie Le Sommer (best player in the league last season). The could soon be joined by Audrey Février, born in Saint-Malo and a U20 French International, whose brother Gaëtan Février was trained at Stade Rennes’ Academy.