NOTBorn under the name Amicale laïque de Billère in 1949, the Béarnais handball club, today the first in New Aquitaine, has once again changed its name. After Billère HB, it had already become Billère Pau Handball Pyrénées a few years ago. Exit Billère at the head of the gondola…
NOTBorn under the name Amicale laïque de Billère in 1949, the Béarnais handball club, today the first in New Aquitaine, has once again changed its name. After Billère HB, it had already become Billère Pau Handball Pyrénées a few years ago. Exit Billère at the head of the gondola, it is now Pau which takes control in the new designation and on the new Pau Billère HB logo. “It’s not a tear, it’s simply an evolution of history. Our desire was for the club to be recognized as a local club, because it was more coherent for it to reach out to as many people as possible,” explains Jean-Yves Lalanne.
The fact remains that another handball club, at national level, also bears the name of Pau upstream, Pau-Nousty Sports. “It’s not a problem, there are Pau FC and Bleuets de Pau,” notes François Bayrou. A downside, the Bleuets are playing in the District this season… when Pau-Nousty is currently 7th in its Nationale 1 group, the 3rd French division. Billère is 9th in Proligue, second tier in France.
Budgetary ambitions
Proof of the club’s transformation, major partnership work has been underway for several seasons and should intensify with the biggest Pau clubs. Under the name “Club des 5”, pooling of practices has regularly taken place for four years with Élan Béarnais, Pau FC, Lons Rugby femmes and the Section Paloise.
Pierre Lahore, general director of the Section and former BHB player, should not be too disoriented by discovering the new logo of the resident club of Sporting d’Este, for the moment, with shapes very similar to that of rugby .
The announcement was made this Monday at Sporting d’Este by the club’s president Christian Laffitte, its general director Julien Olek, and the mayors of Billère Jean-Yves Lalanne and Pau François Bayrou.
Fabrice Borowczyk
Proof of the desire to evolve on a national level, five of the eight new partners are not locals. “To be able to exist in Starligue (1st division, Editor’s note), you need a budget of 2 million euros. From next year, we will increase to 1.5 million (compared to 1.3 currently). 2 million can be reached within two years,” projects Christian Laffitte. Before being even more greedy: “The Fénix Toulouse, which is at the gates of Europe, has a budget of 3.5 million… in the long term it is feasible”.
