Bordeaux look set for season of turmoil
BORDEAUX face Stade Francais in Paris this evening in the final match of the 17th round of the Top 14 season, and the last domestic top-flight match in France before the clubs enjoy a weekend off – their first since the November internationals.
The club formerly coached by Christophe Urios is the very definition of an in-flux side following his departure in mid-November.
Their interim management – a job share between backs coach Frederic Charrier and forwards coach Julien Lairle – are expected to leave at the end of the season. One or both of them may reunite with Urios at Marcel Michelin from July.
Yannick Bru – currently working as a consultant with Sharks in Durban – will take charge of the ambitious club next season, aided and abetted by outgoing France performance director Thibault Giroud. The rest of the coaching team remains, for now, uncertain.
The squad, too, is set to look noticeably different next season. Former France international Remi Lamerat has all-but confirmed he will retire at the end of the current campaign; Italy’s Frederico Mori is swapping Bordeaux for Bayonne; Tom Willis is to join Saracens after a short stint in France; hooker Pablo Dimcheff is heading to ProD2 side Colomiers; scrum-half Jules Gimbert will be a Stade Francais player next season; lock Alban Roussel is going east, young man, to join Lyon; and winger Geoffrey Cros is also heading to the exit door – destination currently unconfirmed. Bayonne and Castres are reportedly both interested.
Another 10 players – including hookers Clement Maynardier and Gabriel Oghre, winger Santiago Cordero, and backrow Caleb Timu are all out of contract at the end of June.
France winger Damian Penaud is the star name currently heading to rather than from Chaban Delmas next season. Brive scrum-half Paul Abadie and back row Tavita Tatafu, currently plying his trade with Tokyo Sungoliath, have also agreed terms; as has Mont-de-Marsan hooker Romain Latterade, while Conor Sa will return from a loan spell at Carcassonne.
Club president Laurent Marti, however, is still fishing in the recruitment market, looking to improve stocks in three or four positions.
Bristol’s Semi Radradra, it seems, is no longer an option – Marti has admitted that salary cap restrictions rule out re-signing the centre this season, given they have already signed Penaud.
Jack Willis – currently with Top 14 rivals Toulouse – is a target, though the French rugby illuminati reckon that his current side will fight to keep hold of their man, following a number of impressive performances in the rouge-et-noir.
They’re also keen to sign Colomiers’ 25-year-old second row Alexandre Ricard – their interest in Romain Taofifenua has waned, reports say. Ricard is under contract with the ProD2 side until 2024, however, so Bordeaux would have to agree a release fee to sign him.
Word is, too, they are interested in centre Alex Nankivell, currently with New Zealand side Chiefs, as they look to add some more pace to a backline that will already include Penaud, Madosh Tambwe and Yoram Moefana.
The Top 14 weekend kicked off 15 minutes before the Six Nations opener in Cardiff, with Toulouse – shorn of seven France internationals and Italy’s Ange Capuozzo – beat a typically spirited Bayonne side 21-16 at Stade Ernest Wallon. The visitors – deservedly fifth in the table coming into the weekend – were well worth their losing bonus point, for finishing within five points, after giving the leaders a difficult examination on their home turf.
Clermont’s pack did the job for them in the first match at Marcel Michelin of the Urios era. Their first three tries against Castres were mauled over from 5m lineouts – there’s no wonder Jules Plisson kept turning down shots at goal in favour of kicks to the corner whenever the opportunity presented itself.
And Peceli Yato – out of contract at the end of the season and attracting interest from several clubs in France – rounded off the match with his hat-trick try, the home side’s fifth and bonus-point score, in the final minute after Josiah Raisuqe was sent off.
It finished 41-26 – but it was a much closer match than the scoreline suggests. Not that it will be much of a comfort for 2018 champions Castres, who suddenly, thanks to Pau’s win over Racing, find themselves worryingly close to the relegation zone.
It was something of a try-fest, too, at Pau, as they beat Racing 92 38-19. The Stade du Hameau faithful got to celebrate six touchdowns, while the visitors ran in three of their own.
Bottom-of-the-table Perpignan edged an understandably tense encounter at 13th-placed Brive 24-22. Racing-bound fly-half Tristan Tedder converted Edward Sawailau’s 75th minute try to win the match for the visitors, and allow them to overtake their opponents in the table.
A 68th-minute Josua Tuisova wonder-try – somewhat in the mould of Duhan van der Merwe’s try score for Scotland yesterday – sealed the deal for Lyon in a muscular match at La Rochelle. But they had to survive wave after wave of late pressure before finally winning 20-16 on the road.
Ihaia West’s 69th-minute penalty decided the final Top 14 match of Saturday in favour of Toulon, who consigned Montpellier to their third home defeat of the season, winning 20-18 at the GGL Stadium.
“The club president is still fishing in the recruitment market, looking to improve stocks”