“If we win tomorrow (Friday, editor’s note) evening,” said full-back Thomas Ramos on Thursday, “we will reach a milestone in the history of our club, and of our sport in general”: it is now done.
Clinics
Faced with a clinical, pragmatic Toulouse team, much more precise, quicker and disciplined than their opponents, Maxime Lucu’s teammates defended furiously, tried and tried to play their rugby, but the Red and Blacks were far too strong.
On the bench, as the minutes ticked away towards the final whistle, the Bordelo-Bèglais seemed stunned, unable to believe it, as if struck by lightning.
Their coach Yannick Bru had warned on Thursday that a final must be played for, not considered lucky to have taken part in it and above all “not to be spectators”.
Yet that is what the UBB players seemed to be: feverish, waiting, too frozen by the stakes, this terrible and exciting stakes of winning a first Brennus Shield.
Their three-quarters, so brilliant during the season, were deprived of the ball, like Damian Penaud. The other UBB winger, Louis Bielle-Biarrey, was taken off prematurely, as a symbol of the impotence of the “Patrouille de France”.
Losing bets
The “bets” attempted by the Bordeaux-Bègles management, that is to say establishing the pillar Ben Tameifuna and especially the opener Mathieu Jalibert, barely returned from injuries but ultimately undoubtedly too fair, did not work out. proven winners.
Jalibert, replaced at 54e minute with his head down and under a few whistles, is thus at the origin of Toulouse’s first try, one of his first kicks having fallen directly into the arms of Thomas Ramos.
Relaunching the game, the Toulouse back set the red and black machine in motion, until Antoine Dupont’s strong try, from the 7e minute, his first in the Top 14 final.
The other gamble of the UBB staff, to play Tameifuna when he had been announced as out at the beginning of the week, was not the most successful either.
The Tongan pillar did not seem at his best and accumulated errors in the scrum, penalizing his teammates, appearing to suffer several times with his shoulder until his exit in the 47the minute, to the applause of the entire Vélodrome.
Succession of tests
Dupont then did a Dupont: he who had already been accelerating the pace, varying his play, since the start of the match, allowed himself the luxury of a double in a personal exploit.
Following a maul, on a ball recovered by Mauvaka, the captain of the French the Blues Maxime Lucu, before going to flatten (22-3, 23e).
In the second half, the Toulouse team, in complete control, initially just managed, bringing in all their substitutes so that the party was complete.
Before the match turned into a nightmare for UBB, with a succession of tries from the 64th minute.
More than a recitation, the match turned into humiliation. The Vélodrome could sing and the Toulouse party could begin.
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