Takeover soap opera rumbles on at Beziers
Alot can happen in a month. A month ago, French clubs were taking their first, cautious steps out of lockdown. Players were undergoing a series of medical tests and beginning socially distanced individual training programmes.
As of this week, what restrictions that remained were suddenly lifted without much warning, allowing ball-in-hand and early contact training.
A month ago, it seemed Beziers were on the brink of that Christophe Dominici-fronted Emirati buyout that would wipe out their €5m debt, inject millions into their budget, bring in a Fantasy Rugby-level raft of new players, and set the sun rising on a new era of dominance that would, in time, rival that of the 70s and 80s.
As of this week – the same day training restrictions were lifted – that offer was rejected in favour of a late bid with former Toulouse president Rene Bouscatel at its helm.
But this daytime soap opera story is far from over.
In an interview on Friday afternoon, Beziers’ former international prop Jean-Louis Martin told
L’Equipe the Emirati deal would be finalised this weekend. The Bouscatel project, he said, was ‘buried’.
According to Martin, the day before, a group of about 20 former players had urged the club’s major shareholders to reconsider the bigmoney offer from the UAE. The club, he said, had erred in announcing it had accepted the Bouscatel deal. He insisted that, on Saturday, co-president Cédric Bistué – the majority shareholder, according to Martin – would go to Paris to finalise the Emirati buyout.
Three days previously, the club had issued a statement saying their lawyer had received no credible information about the finances of the deal from the Emirati bidders.
It went on: “The chairmen PierreOlivier Valaize, Cédric Bistué and the majority of the shareholders have therefore just accepted a real project ... by Mr Louis-Pierre Angelotti who has called upon Mr
Rene Bouscatel whose experience and expertise cannot be disputed.”
That evening, Christophe Dominici, the public face of the failed bid, stood in front of the statue of Beziers’ legend Armand Vaquerin to rail against the directors who had rejected the offer he was fronting.
“We are suffering an injustice,” the former France winger told a crowd of a few hundred people and local media as the sun set over Stade Raoul-Barrière. “Everything was validated. We signed a confidentiality agreement on June 2.
“I’ve worked on this project for two-and-a-half months, day and night. I wanted to put together a great team, with national and international players. We wanted to make this the biggest club in Europe.”
Dominici refused to accept defeat. “I wanted to do something for this beautiful club. I know there’s a lot of anger among you today and I have some anger too.
“I want to set the record straight. We’ve been treated in this story as if we were nothing. There has been a lack of respect and elegance on the part of the current leadership.”
It had looked, up until then, the Dominici deal – despite a sticky start – was close to done.
He had publicly promised the moon to fans of the club. A glorious Galactico rebirth of a sleeping French rugby giant. Players to cry for – Ma’a Nonu, Santiago Medrano, Jordan Taufua, Matias Alemanno, Charly Malie, Benjamin Fall, Marika Koroibete and Semesa Rokoduguni – were among those ‘ready to come’ to reignite the club Dominici told the crowd on Tuesday evening.
Other names mentioned in excited media dispatches in the run-up to Tuesday’s surprise announcement had included Dan Biggar, Juan Imhoff, Beauden Barrett – really – and Gabriel Lacroix. All had, reportedly, been contacted. None, it was also reported, had responded.
That was not all. Dominici told the crowd that Rodrigo Roncero and Juan Martin Hernandez were ready to lead the coaching ticket – France U20 coach Sébastien Piqueronies had previously ruled himself out, and Michael Cheika was briefly linked to the post. Freddie Michalak was lined up as sporting director.
Then, the Bouscatel deal apparently derailed everything.
What started as an advisory role to the management buyout team developed first into a project development role – and then into a full-blown job offer.
“I was consulted towards the end of March by shareholders from the Beziers club’s pro sector,” Bouscatel said, two days before Martin’s revelation.
“Initially, they wanted to have my opinion and expertise on the situation of the ASBH. Then, they asked me how it was possible to structure and develop the club economically and sportingly.
“And then, a few days ago, they told me that this project suited them perfectly. It’s a project that concerns the whole club, that is to say the amateur association, the training centre as well as the professional sector.
“It respects the sporting culture of this club, based on training, with an economic model that would generate resources. It is a truly Biterrois project. The shareholders liked it, they asked me to take over the management…”
If anyone knows about running a professional French rugby club, it’s the 74-year-old Bouscatel. He was president of Toulouse from 1992 to 2017 – in which time they won the French championship nine times, and the European Cup four times, a run that rivals Beziers’ ten French titles between 1971 and 1984.
More importantly, perhaps, he took charge at European rugby’s most successful side when they were in dire straits. He will soon run a club from a similar troubled starting position.
His deal was less instantly ambitious than the Emirati one – no big names were bandied wildly about. Bouscatel was planning to work with the current GM, former international fly-half David Aucagne, to develop a development plan for current and future players.
It was noteworthy that Bouscatel appeared determined to keep the Beziers identity. As he said: “The sports project will be Biterrois, with its own culture. Big clubs have a culture that must be respected.”
Maybe that was what sold the project to the club on Tuesday.
Rugby clubs, more than most perhaps, live off their identities, their histories, their values – an amorphous, nebulous, frustratingly impossible collation of concepts that sets each one apart from the other. Get that, build on it, and success has a better chance of following.
Unlike Dominici, Bouscatel had not promised Beziers the world. He had promised a rugby club that plugged back into fans’ expectations. That, clearly, was not good enough for everyone – he has been on the receiving end of some unsavoury messages since Tuesday’s announcement.
Whether those who favour the Dominici-led project have been blinded by the money remains to be seen … along with the outcome of this nightmare of a buyout.
“Dominici had promised the moon to fans. A glorious Galactico rebirth of a sleeping giant.”