Toulouse and its “infernal machine” correct Bordeaux – Libération

Crushing winner over Bordeaux, 59-3, the red and black club won its 23rd French championship title at the end of a one-sided final.

On the evening of the second Top 14 semi-final, Saturday 22 June at the Matmut Atlantique in Bordeaux, something suggested that the dice had already been implicitly cast between one club, Stade Toulousain, which was preparing to play the 30th final of a prestigious history spanning decades, and another, Union Bègles Bordeaux, qualified in the nick of time against Stade Français, which, after having stumbled three times on the penultimate step of the season, was just happy to finally reach the end of the exercise. Because wasn’t there a kind of capitulation, naturally unconscious, in the mouth of the captain and scrum-half of UBB, Maxime Lucu, stating at the final whistle: “Just getting through this milestone is already very good”? Implied (then unspeakable), don’t ask us for the impossible.

In fact, less than a week later, it was the ogre and the “Tom Thumb” (a term assumed by the not-quite-scant Girondin pillar, Jefferson Poirot) who appeared on the grass of the Stade Vélodrome in Marseille. A saga spanning over a century and marked by twenty-two national titles (plus six European ones, a record, on all counts) on one side, a mere twenty years of existence (even if the foundations are much older) and zero titles on the other. And, to stick to the 2023-24 chapter, more than ten long months of a season overwhelmingly dominated by Toulouse, who remained in the leading group throughout the regular Top 14 season, despite the injustice caused by the World Cup, which for a long time deprived them of all their best players who form the backbone of the French XV – a team ranked 2, or even 3, like the one that went to win in Montpellier, attesting to an unambiguous supremacy. It’s simple, with the exception of one half-time, the first, in the semi-final against La Rochelle, the group coached by Ugo Mola never trembled. And even less than ever, during the most unbalanced final in history!

Rugby lesson

Because, on the Aquitaine side, we wanted to be convinced that with a victory everywhere in the championship, the beauty was not fatally bent in advance. And that with the last minute resurrections, Matthieu Jalibert and Ben Tameifuna, there had to be a way, even if it was voodoo, to stop the infernal red and black winning machine (nine finals in a row, France and Europe combined, pocketed since 2008). Calembredaine, yes.

There were still three official hours of the campaign left at kick-off, but President Macron had preferred to spare himself the humiliation of jeers by being carried (very?) pale to Marseille. The Bordeaux team, on the other hand, had no choice: invited to the banquet to nibble only the crumbs, the aptly named Penaud and his ilk had to face the evidence, just a handful of minutes after kick-off, of Toulouse’s overwhelming superiority and even more. As illustrated by the two tries scored quickly by the extraterrestrial Antoine Dupont, who brought all the Willis, Ramos, Roumats, etc., in his sparkling wake. 59-3 (despite more than ten points wasted on foot by the champions). A rugby lesson that numbed the emotion, sometimes leaving the audience speechless, quickly sated on one side and stunned on the other.

“To infinity and beyond”

“Can’t Stop”: the two halves started with the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ riff and, a total of nine tries later, the fact is that Stade Toulousain was simply unstoppable in all areas, the best team in France and certainly on the planet, which too often the opponent seemed to watch play, despite some offensive efforts as sporadic as they were futile in the second half. “A steamroller”, a “Formula 1”, an “infernal machine”, a “locomotive”, Yannick Bru, the Bordeaux coach, was not stingy with images to dissect the “snub”, even offering “apologies” to the supporters.

Crowned for the 23rd time, with a new double (his third) if we add the continental title against Leinster, Toulouse is jubilant. “The group, the club, the team work in depth so that young guys can flourish in this incredible sport. They (his players, editor’s note) have never disappointed me in what they committed to doing. But above all I like the process, the path, the content, and if it wins it’s nice. Now, we manage to close a remarkable season”, savored Ugo Mola with a legitimate pleasure that did not prohibit a certain balance in the analysis, when, in the background we could hear the music vibrating the locker room.

Just before, on TV, scrum-half Antoine Dupont praised “the desire, enthusiasm and calm” that allow you to “win matches at this level”, saluting the “extent” of a club that, Mola observed, had totaled no less than “thirty-seven different scorers” during the season. Most certainly a record. Like the twenty new points scored by Thomas Ramos, which made him the best scorer (1792) in the history of Toulouse. “And I’m sure that this group is not going to stop there”, predicted the international full-back, thus suggesting a variation of Buzz Lightyear’s motto, “To infinity and beyond”.