This Saturday, Racing 92 plays its first match of the Top 14 season at home. Deprived of their home at La Défense Arena, they will host their opponents at least three times at the Stade Duvauchelle in Créteil. This situation does not please the supporters.
The Dominique Duvauchelle stadium in Créteil will host the Top 14 match between Racing 92 and ASM Clermont this Saturday, September 14 at 4:30 p.m. This is the first match in a series of three relocated matches, while La Défense Arena is reconfigured after hosting the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Then there will be the reception of Bordeaux-Bègles on September 21, and La Rochelle, on the 28th. Later, on November 30 and December 7. It will also be necessary to find a stadium to host Stade Toulousain and the Harlequins.
Too much travel time
These temporary changes do not please everyone, however. Some supporters refuse to travel so far to get to the stadium. “We have nothing against Créteil. I really like Racing, but not to the point of doing 1h30 there and 1h30 back on a Saturday afternoon,” Romain, a member of the XV Ciel et Blanc association who is also upset about the price, told BFMTV.com.
“Before, with a subscription you could enjoy at least 13 Top 14 matches and two European Cup matches. Now, you have fewer matches and have to pay for tickets in Créteil.”
Christophe, a long-time supporter and also a member of XV Ciel et Blanc, will not be going to Créteil either. “I’m boycotting. I have no business being there. I refused to take out a season ticket. I love my club, I would die for it, but with all the relocations we’ve suffered in recent years, without a permanent stadium, we’ve lost a bit of the soul of a club,” he explains, citing trips to Vannes, Le Havre and Lens.
“We were very happy to arrive at the Arena, but now we are nostalgic for Yves-du-Manoir,” he admits, while the Parisian club left its Colombes home in 2017 to join La Défense Arena.
A great atmosphere
Fabrice de Martino, president of the Génération Yves du Manoir supporters’ association, thinks that few supporters will make the trip. “I send reminders every day to motivate them. I explained how to get there. It’s the close suburbs of Paris. We can’t call it a supporters’ strike, but they are reluctant to travel.”
The latter has good memories of the two relocations to Auxerre last year. “The Abbé Deschamps stadium was a great atmosphere, we were able to talk with football fans who were discovering rugby. That’s what we expect from Duvauchelle.”
The three supporters believe that the club, by returning to the Yves-du-Manoir stadium, will be able to identify with a town, Colombes, and rekindle a dynamic.
Créteil does not want to disappoint
For Créteil, on the other hand, the rental of the Duvauchelle stadium to Racing 92 is a rare opportunity to host an elite match of a major sport. The Lusitanos, a resident football club, left Ligue 2 in 2016 and is now in the fourth division.
“We are 15 minutes from their Plessis-Robinson training centre. The stadium was opened in 1943, but it is still going strong thanks to investments in the pitch and the teams who look after it,” explains Grand Paris Sud Est Avenir, the inter-municipal authority that owns the facility and is ready to “develop things over the long term” with the rugby club.
