2023-06-18 10:25:55
Although a place in the final is never undeserved, as a rugby season is both long, exhausting and full of pitfalls, let’s admit that the 2022 poster, which pitted Castres against Montpellier, did not have the highest fantasy coefficients. At the exact opposite of the vintage 2023 which saw clash, Saturday June 17, in the eminently summer humidity of a Stade de France in red and yellow, Toulouse with La Rochelle. Either what exists today as incandescent on a national scale, if not more, with no less than 22 internationals in the credits of a recital which, concluded by a final fantastic ride by Romain Ntamack, will have, at the end of the end of the suspense, deprived La Rochelle of a first hexagonal title which, promised sworn, should not, this time, escape him. 29-26.
And a great fiesta, noisy and ragged, to complete a season only with attendance records broken in the stadiums (2.7 million spectators) and repeated continental consecrations (double Champions Cup/Challenge Cup for the third year consecutive), we now hope to see it continue until the Indian summer.
Vitality
Thus, with Clermont adrift, Castres still perceived with a touch of condescension by the metropolises, Toulon, Racing or the too inconstant French Stadium, Toulouse and La Rochelle embody, until further notice, the lasting vitality of a tricolor rugby to which we give a lot of credit. Namely, on the one hand the biggest French club, in the lead almost all this year of the championship phase of the Top 14 and which lives the slightest season without a title, as in 2022, like an anomaly; and La Rochelle, once again European champion (after its resounding victory against Leinster, at the end of May), which in less than a decade has become a major reference, as much respected as it is feared, although still in search of a first national coronation to which he will never have believed so much as on June 17.
In 2021, already, the final opposed the same two opponents, and it was Stade Toulousain who had made their experience speak, 18-8, without shaking. Afflicted by eight defeats in the last nine confrontations, La Rochelle tried to highlight the recent experience acquired to deny the hypothesis of a curse, speaking of “trust” and of «pression positive». But it’s back in 2023… But what is all this about? A raid in the money time of the player who had just committed two blunders, a beta forward and, above all, an ill-adjusted penalty which gave La Rochelle a smile that we imagined definitive.
In truth, Toulouse, in the absence of serenity, had enough tenacity – and an ounce of baraka – to believe in its lucky star after going through all the states, leading by ten points (13-3), then, between the end of the first half and the start of the second, conceding a 17-0 under the battering of the opposing pack. “We believed in it, we didn’t give up and we were rewarded. Supported by a sturdy bench which brought freshness, it’s a beautiful image to have been able to remain united, having suffered so much, to get this title. analyzed the third line, François Cros, however aware of not having made a perfect copy (cf. a forward costing a try in Toulouse)… Just like Jonathan Danty, who missed out on the La Rochelle side, or Antoine Hastoy, squandering nine points on foot, so essential at this level.
“We have earned the right to enjoy it”
Apart from the 79,804 lucky people present in the stadium, more than a hundred countries in the world, on five continents, were able to follow the epilogue of the Top 14 live, which therefore saw the Toulouse stadium crowned for the 22nd time in its history, against to the Maritimes reduced to a “marry team”, because still without a Brennus shield to lift and yet physically up to it, when it was pressed on the reserve, after very tough spring games.
Rugby being what it is, Romain Ntamack hailed as much “collective” that his apple, while admitting, about his feat (a breakthrough of 60 meters two minutes from the end, therefore) that this is the kind of action that “Marks a career, if not a life: scoring the winning try in the championship final, I don’t even know if I dreamed of it as a child”. “But I’m lucky to have extraordinary guys next to me who believed in it to the end and made me look up after my little bullshit [la pénaltouche ratée, à six minutes de la fin, ndlr]developed the opener. I am very proud and relieved for this club which is doing everything possible to grow young people, moreover the hopes have also just been champions of France and in our group, there were guys who were not even sure the score sheet and encouraged us, without ever making the mouth. Morality: “We have earned the right to enjoy it…for a few days.”
The time that, on June 21, the boss of the XV of France, Fabien Galthié, announced the list of 42 players selected to prepare for the World Cup, which begins on September 8. “And there, we will be in the same boat, with another objective, even more beautiful, bigger”, consoled himself the Rochelais Grégory Alldritt, defeated captain, his gaze already turned towards the horizon.
#Rochelle #Toulousains #stages #Liberation