2023-11-14 11:02:36
Like some of his French teammates, Thomas Ramos, 28, was back on the pitches of the top 14 last weekend, a month after the cruel disappointment against South Africa (28-29) in the quarter-final of the Rugby World Cup.
“It took a little time to digest the elimination,” explains the Stade Toulouse scorer in an interview with The Team. But spending too much time without playing makes you think. » Ramos explains that he cried after the defeat, rewatched the match twice in 72 hours to try to understand and only took five short days of vacation with his wife before wanting to sweat again in a team.
“We only have ourselves to blame”
“Anyway, everywhere you go they only talk to you about that,” he sums up. We had things prepared. We rather dominated the South Africans, especially in the first half. I read that we hadn’t used the kicking game much even though we had done it a lot for four years. But when we dominate like this… Obviously, we use it less. I remain convinced that we gave them 19 points too easily. It’s too much ! We only have ourselves to blame. »
For him, the Blues should have done better on high balls… and no one would have had to argue about the refereeing. “If we hadn’t taken 19 points too easily, we wouldn’t be talking about it,” he admits. Afterwards, we are not going to repeat history. We could perhaps have scored on this action where Etzebeth hits the ball (at the start of the match). These are frustrating actions. We must learn from these situations. At international level you have to kill the matches. »
“It happens very rarely”
The Mazamétain especially returned to a rare image which went around the planet. Cheslin Kolbe’s counter after a supersonic run on his conversion attempt. “At first I have an effect of surprise. It happens very rarely. I say to myself: damn, it happened to me! Looking back at the match, I don’t feel like I changed anything in my routine, he says. Afterwards, when everyone tells you “he left before”, you want to say it too (…) It was more the responsibility of the video refereeing. These are two points that could have helped us win. I tell myself that maybe this will happen to me only once in my career. And it happened that day. It’s like that. And this is not to take away responsibilities from me, but I continue to say that if we had not taken 19 points…”
Like the mockery heard during his return to Perpignan (43-34), Ramos knows that his misadventure risks following him for a while but considers that “it’s the game”. And hopes to quickly shine in the championship and in the European Cup with Toulouse to ease a pill that will stay stuck in the throat for a while.
Then will come the VI Nations tournament. “After the failure of the World Cup, we will all be keen to start again as high as possible,” he says. The objective will be to win the Tournament to show that we remain competitors. »
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