Rougerie’s aiming for record-with a little help
Of all the 95 tries scored by Aurelian Rougerie during his monumental career with Clermont, the most recent evokes human values of a high order.
He scored it against Bayonne with, at his side, co-centre Damian Penaud, who was a three-year-old toddler when Rougerie first began to build his mountainous total in the French championship.
The partnership for Penaud, 20, and Rougerie, 36, is not destined to last, given their ages, but has already produced an unforgettable moment.
Just three minutes into the game, Penaud, who scored a hat-trick of tries against England U20s last year, burst through with the try-line at his mercy.
Instead of touching down unopposed, however, he turned to find Rougerie behind him and offered him the score on a plate.
The try leaves Rougerie just five behind the professional record of 100 set by winger Laurent Arbo, formerly with Perpignan, Brive, Castres and Montpellier.
Unlike Rougerie who has spent all 18 years of his playing career with his beloved home-town club Clermont, for whom his father Jacques also played.
And that will be extended by at least another season after the recent signing of another contract extension.
So Rougerie will still be playing at 37 whereas Toulon winger Vincent Clerc, even closer to the magic ton on 98 tries, may never turn out again.
Clerc, 35, is out for the season with a ruptured Achilles tendon and, having started just two games for Toulon since his move from Toulouse, is unlikely to be offered a new contract.
Penaud, whose father Alain was a French international fly-half who once played a season for Saracens, is rightly being lauded for his rare, touching gesture in a Top 14 arena better known for its money, muscle and ferocious intensity.
The sorcerer and his apprentice hugged each other before Penaud later explained: “Roro does so much for me in training. He is helping me develop and I know he really wants to beat this record. I was very happy to be able to give him this present.”
Quite an attitude from a first-year youngster with only one Clermont try to his own name as a stand-in for superstar Wesley Fofana, out for the season with injury. He went on to score another for himself later in the win over Bayonne.
Penaud is the future, but Rougerie still has burning ambitions that encourage him to lay aside the back pains that assail him the morning after he plays. For, with time running out, he contemplates a trophy cabinet that still has plenty of spaces waiting to be filled.
His fellow English backs Nick Abendanon and David Strettle have both been made aware by fans they are there to change a history of failure when the big prizes are handed out.
For Rougerie, who handed Strettle a simple chance to score during a recent win over Bordeaux-Begles, has had only one Top 14 title to celebrate during his marathon stint and that was in 2010.
On both sides of that success, Clermont lost five championship finals as well as two at top European level.
Once again this season they are in pole position to break what some call a hoodoo and others attribute to vulnerability under maximum pressure.
For Clermont lead the Top 14 and their triumphant run in the Champions Cup has won them a home quarter-final in early April against Toulon.
Eric De Cromieres, the Clermont president, says: “Europe has a special flavour but, frankly, we are not exactly overstocked with championships, either.
“We have been very competitive over ten years but, out of the 20 titles handed out in this period, we have managed to win only one. So the real special flavour is a title. We are not going to be choosy over which competition it is.”
Rougerie, who was succeeded by flanker Damien Chouly as captain once it became clear his years would reduce his playing time, thought hard before agreeing to continue.
He said: “I did hesitate for a long time because I needed to feel I had the right to play in this squad. I wasn’t looking for a free ride or a favour. If I didn’t count for even one of them, it was not worth carrying on”.
There will be little time for sentiment in the months to come.
Penaud’s remarkable generosity will not become the norm and, if Rougerie had the choice between his landmark century and some shiny silverware, he would have only one pick for the team.
His coach Frank Azema knows that but, even as a battle-hardened onetime Clermont centre, himself, he saw that 95th try as a moving symbol of generation change.
Azema says: “Seeing that gave me goosebumps, frankly. It is the result of the commitment Roro has shown towards this boy. You see that he wanted to give back what has been given to him. It gave me a lot of pleasure.”
“The try leaves Rougerie just five behind the professional record of 100 set by winger Laurent Arbo”