Azema in for Collazo at Toulon – at a price!
Two stories have gripped French rugby this week – the changing of the coach at Toulon, and the possibility of a Jalibert-Ntamack partnership at 10 and 12 for France when the November internationals kick off next week.
It seems the latter – as reported last week – is going to happen against Argentina at Stade de France on Saturday night. All the images out of the French national headquarters at Marcoussis this week show the two working in tandem, in numbered bibs that it’s probably safe to assume give the game away. The matchday squad will be confirmed next week.
The former had been coming for some time. Patrice Collazo and Toulon formally agreed to go their separate ways ‘by mutual consent’ on Tuesday, less than two days after watching helplessly from the sidelines as his side capitulated 39-6 at La Rochelle, the club he left three years ago to join the three-time European champions.
Former Clermont manager Franck Azema was quickly installed as favourite for the vacant Toulon hotseat. And, by Thursday, he was confirmed as the new general manager charged with turning around the fortunes of a club that was, heading into the weekend, languishing in 13th place in the table.
It marked the end of one difficult period for the club – and, potentially, the beginning of another.
Collazo’s position, despite repeated public votes of confidence from club president Bernard Lemaitre, had become untenable. After just two wins in their opening eight matches, disillusioned fans, branded ‘pseudo-supporters’ by the under-fire coach, had become increasingly vocal – a protest outside Toulon’s Berg training centre, calling for Collazo’s dismissal, had been scheduled to take place last week – until events in the boardroom took over. Just three weeks before the inevitable finally happened, Lemaitre had very publicly pointed the finger of blame firmly in the direction of the players. “I read that the players are tired of the situation,” he told journalists. “But they are not tired of their salary... and if it was the opposite, if the club was tired of its players?”
But there was no hiding the fact that, under Collazo, Toulon have fallen far from the heights of the early to mid-2010s. As well as their three European titles, the Var side were French champions in 2014, and finalists in 2016 and 2017. Since he arrived in 2018, they have failed to reach the play-off phase of the domestic season.
Admittedly, Collazo could point to the club’s long absentee list in the season’s opening 10-match block. Star signing Cheslin Kolbe has yet to play anything other than an ambassadorial role. Eben Etzebeth, Charles Ollivon, Baptiste Serin, and Christopher Tolofua have yet to play this season. Sergio Parisse is out with a wrist injury. Mitigation, certainly, but there’s no denying the fact he was long out of ideas. The end, when it came, was perhaps a merciful release for both coach and club.
But hiring Azema has come with additional complications. The coach still had a year left on his contract at Clermont when he left the club at the end of last season. Montpellier, apparently wanted him, but baulked at the cost of releasing him from his contract. So, he was effectively on gardening leave, doing the odd bit of TV punditry work, when Toulon called.
French employment law is a minefield, but Azema and Clermont have different ideas about his contract status. He believes that he is a free agent. Clermont don’t. And they’re not happy. They have issued a statement, which stops just short of demanding their coach back, but calls on the LNR take some form of action. It will all – most probably – end in compensation.
Toulon’s preparations for yesterday’s match – their first non-primetime TV outing of the season – were handled by defence coach and former Munster backrow James Coughlan, with Azema arriving too late to make any meaningful impression.
Plans, however, were fundamentally thrown out of the window by the weather. Toulon was in the path of what is known as an ‘episode cevenol’, which in practical terms means an awful lot of rain is dumped in a very localised area in a short period of time. The match was effectively played out under water and any hope of attractive, attacking rugby vanished before kick-off.
And the brief Coughlan-led interregnum ended in a 13-9 victory for Toulon over Biarritz – their third of the season – while an appreciative Azema watched on.
It was a much-needed win, as Perpignan, bottom of the table heading into the weekend, beat La Rochelle 22-13 at Stade Aime Giral courtesy of a hat-trick from veteran centre Afusipa Taumoepeau.
The heavy rain that submerged Stade Mayol, also hit Montpellier’s match against Lyon at the GGL. It was the visitors who suffered worst in conditions that weren’t as bad as they had been a little further east two hours earlier, but were dismal enough.
Lima Sopoaga, had a Hallowe’en horror on his first start for his new club – his in-goal knock-on was snapped up by Montpellier’s opportunistic Cobus Reinach for the second try of the game, which came in between two penalty tries, as the hosts won 30-8, but were denied a try-scoring bonus by a late score from the visitors’ replacement flyhalf Jean-Marc Doussain.
Earlier Castres won a typically hard-fought match against Brive 23-22 to climb provisionally to third in the table, helped in part by results elsewhere. The final score was closer than it perhaps should have been but proof once again that it’s unwise to underestimate the gnarly Brivistes.
And ex-Leicester player Zack Henry kicked all Pau’s points and won the beret awarded to the player of the match as they beat Stade Francais 18-9 at home.
UJ Sueteni scored one try and made another as Bordeaux picked up a bonus-point 25-9 win over Clermont at Stade Chaban Delmas to provisionally overtake Toulouse at the top of the table, with the champions to play this evening.All three Racing 92 players released from the France camp earlier this week – Bernard Le Roux, Ibrahim Diallo and Donovan Taofifenua are set to start tonight’s crucial Top 14 match against Toulouse at La Defense Arena, while both Camille Chat and Teddy Thomas return from injury. Finn Russell is on the bench.
“Azema and Clermont have different ideas about his contract status”