René Bonnet

René Bonnet was a French footballer who played as a defender for AS Française and the French national team in 1913–14.

Biography Very little is known about his life; Bonnet was playing football for AS Française in 1913, when the USFSA selected him to play for the so-called Lions des Flandres, a regional scratch team representing Northern France, in a friendly match against the English Wanderers on 1 November; he scored an own goal in an eventual 1–4 loss.

Three months later, on 8 February 1914, Bonnet earned his first (and only) international cap for France in an away friendly against Luxembourg, playing the full 90 minutes both as a defender and as a captain as France suffered a 5–4 loss. His date of birth is unknown, but the most frequently cited year is 1880, which means that he would have been 33 or 34 years old during his only international match, which seems quite improbable given that 30-year-old players were extremely rare in the French team before the First World War.

Honours AS Française USFSA Paris Championship: Champions (1): 1913–14