French break the mould with move to Marseilles
BY my reckoning Friday night’s Six Nations game between France and Italy at Stade Velodrome in Marseille will be the first time a Championship fixture has been held outside of one of the ‘capital’ cities since 1954 which was the last time Belfast and Swansea appeared on the international fixture list. Since then the provinces have been studiously ignored. It’s a novel departure from France who, in fairness, have also always shown a willingness to put aside strictly financial implications and stage some of their big November fixtures out of Paris with Toulouse, Bordeaux and, indeed, Marseille getting their share of games. Massive ground improvements in recent years means the Stade Velodrome now boasts a capacity of 67, 344 – it’s the second biggest stadium in France – so the FFR can at least be assured it will not take a huge financial hit if the game is close to a sell out. The ground record is currently 65,025 for the Olympique Marseille football game against PSG last February. France already have a formidable record at the ground in the other games with Les Blues marking their first ever match there with a 42-33 win over the All Blacks in 2000. They also reeled off wins in Marseilles against Australia, South Africa and an England second string in a World Cup warm up game in 2003 before slipping to defeat against the Pumas in 2004.
Since then it has virtually been wins all the way against Australia, England again, Georgia, Argentina and Fiji save for a defeat against New Zealand in 2009.
The Stade also hosted six games at RWC2007, the most memorable surely being the two quarter-finals one sunny weekend with England lodging a surprise 12-10 win over Australia and Fiji giving South Africa plenty to think about before the Springboks won 37-20.
The Stade has a rich sporting background having been built originally as a cycling and football venue. It retained its cycling usage until 1985 when ironically Bernard Tapie – a cycling devotee who bankrolled the famous La Vie Clair cycling team as well as Olympic Marseilles – had the famous banked concrete track ripped out in an expensive renovation aimed to put more bums on seats and of course make more money.
Prior to that the Stadium provided, alas, the last finish of Tom Simpson’s career. The British cyclist finished a strong seventh in the Stade after a sweltering six hour stage on July 12, 1967 behind Raymond Riotte but less than 24 hours later he rode to his death close to the summit of Mont Ventoux.
The Stadium also hosted the 1972 World track cycling championships where Great Britain’s Hugh Porter won the Individual Pursuit title and the cycling theme continued last summer when it hosted the start and finish of the final day time-trial at the 2017 Tour de France which saw Chris Froome confirmed as the winner.