Clerc feels driven to repay debt to Toulon
Most of the good things come in threes for Vincent Clerc, the veteran winger who will share a Toulon dressingroom with Chris Ashton this season.
Three elite European trophies and three Top 14 championships with Toulouse plus three Six Nations titles with France.
But the three events he wants most to forget are the only appearances he managed to make for Toulon during a first season in their colours wrecked by injury.
Two starts, a home debut to Brive and a trip to Clermont with a brief run-out at Montpellier in between. All ending in defeat.
Showman Ashton, 30, will hope to conjure up a far different scenario when he makes his grand entrance on the rebound from Saracens.
But, if he needs any inspiration, he has only to look at Clerc who, fully six years older, is seeking a last hurrah after rupturing his Achilles tendon in both legs.
You might have thought that two operations to repair such crippling injuries would have ushered him towards inevitable retirement.
Not a bit of it. He is will join Ashton next-month on a preseason tour of Argentina to prove his readiness for a more appropriate goodbye.
It could turn out to be an instructive period for hothead Ashton. For Clerc, whose fatherin-law is France boss Guy Noves, has been able to construct a fabulous career as the image of discretion.
He and Ashton topped the tryscoring charts at the 2011 World Cup with six each in New Zealand. Before those exploits and ever since, both have built a sizeable heritage.
Ashton with 80 tries for Northampton and Saracens, Clerc with 98 for Toulouse, just two behind the all-time professional French record of 100.
That is held by journeyman winger Laurent Arbo, now a trainer with Perpignan, his first club before he went on to play for Brive, Pau, Castres and Montpellier. Arbo, whose mark is pursued, too, by Clermont centre Aurelien Rougerie on 95, knows the thirst that drives Clerc on when most backs of his age are left with only memories.
He says: “When I didn’t score, I left the field feeling frustrated. I needed tries like a vampire needs blood and I see the same thing in Vincent.”
Clerc, at the end of his initial contract this month, has been retained by Toulon as an injury replacement for South African star Bryan Habana. Many expect that deal to be extended for the season.
He had a special reason for resisting the temptation to give up when the second tendon snapped. It has its roots in his last, distressing days with Toulouse and his instant acceptance by Toulon.
And also in the guilt he experienced in not giving the club that welcomed him so warmly any value for money.
After being encouraged by Toulouse to believe a final contract would allow him a dignified departure from the club he had served for 14 years, he felt humiliated to be coldly shown the door.
Clerc says: “The way it ended will remain a scar. I will always hold it against the people behind my departure because they deceived and hurt me. It will not change the love I have for the club, but I would have liked a different ending.
“I was very touched by the call from Mourad Boudjellal after what happened to me. He gave me his confidence very quickly and that is why I have this feeling of guilt.
“It was that feeling that made me come back too soon from my first injury. That has been the hardest thing to handle. The club had given me a fresh chance and there was nothing I could prove to them. It has been a weight which I still feel.”
Ashton, too, has significant motivation. Not only from his rejection from England but by Saracens’ thinly-veiled suspicion he has made a mistake in leaving them for a new life in France.
He will face competition, not only from Clerc but from powerful Fijian Josua Tuisova and, eventually, Habana.
All four wingers will be keen to see Toulon succeed in their current attempt to sign centre Malakai Fekitoa, the 24-year-old All-Black World Cup winner.
On the way out, among Aussie heros like Matt Giteau and Drew Michell, is their compatriot James O’Connor who exits without the same distinction.
He and Racing forward Ali Williams were arrested by police while buying cocaine from a Parisian dealer earlier this year.
Their shame was given a new airing after a report last week by the government’s anti-doping agency highlighted abuse of that drug in the game.
Notably in Rugby League whose Federation president Marc Palanques stormed: “I think the report has got the wrong rugby. No League player has been arrested outside a night-club dealing and taking cocaine”.
Xavier Bigard, an agency scientist, said: “I think cocaine is being consumed regularly and not only as recreation. Exciting the central nervous system in a sport like rugby can obviously affect performances.”