Under his leadership, Montpellier has just had six successes. Joan Caudullo, appointed in June in a difficult context, is taking up the challenge of rebuilding the MHR. Portrait of a former stubborn player who in his childhood came to encourage Montpellier at Sabathé.
It’s the surprise of the first half of the season. Joan Caudullo is seriously starting to make a name for himself in the small world of Top 14 coaches. After a somewhat laborious start under his direction, Montpellier has just won six matches in a row and qualified for the knockout stages of the Challenge Cup. . And Caudullo now dares to evoke, with caution, his challenge: to approach or seize a possible sixth place in the Top 14. This will be his spur: to prove the famous arbitration of Mohed Altrad last June.
The boss of the MHR had chosen to say goodbye to Patrice Collazo’s staff who had just fulfilled their mission, that of saving the club’s place in the Top 14 at the last minute. He favored an internal solution, supported by those we will call “the historic Montpellier residents. Joan Caudullo, boss of the training center, thus found himself at the forefront, even if above him, Bernard Laporte retained his role as director of rugby. Altrad’s job was to strike subtle balances, like a President of the Republic after a close legislative election. For now, the Laporte-Caudullo diarchy looks like a winning ticket. The first undoubtedly needed a filter, a sort of shock absorber so that its influence could be fully exerted without offending certain susceptibilities too much. We also know that Laporte has taken head-on the reorganization of the squad, in particular by parting with eleven players under contract and by “offering” a few nuggets to his junior, including Hogg or Vunipola. Caudullo continues: “On the evening of the winning play-off, I received a call to meet the president the next morning. It happened quite quickly. I was asked: “Do you want to be the person to implement a project labeled “Montpellier”?” The president had two or three conditions, there was Benoît Paillaugue who already worked at the training center, then I proposed an organization chart and he accepted it. Afterwards, there were different allegations, but I don’t want to judge. What matters to me is the image of my club.”
With Joan Caudullo, the notion of local culture is not an empty word. “I was trained in Jacou and I arrived in Montpellier as an Alamercery cadet. We made a semi-final, which was rare at the time. We lost to Grégory Lamboley’s Massy who lost in the final to at Toulouse by Frédéric Michalak.”
“I only had Sabathé in mind”
The MHR, he had had it in the back of his mind since childhood through a mythical and crazy stadium, Sabathé: “With my father, I went to see the matches at Sabathé. I wanted to play on this pitch. Today, young people want to be professional before identifying with a club. I only had this stadium in mind and my references, these were the players that I invite today in the pre-matches, the Pascal Cances, the Jean-Jacques Sauveterre.”
Joan Caudullo was nursed at this MRC in the 80s and 90s, trained by André Quilis, Pascal Mancuso and his assumed industrious style. This heritage left its mark on him. This is what gives his statements an authenticity that one would not find in all professional coaches. Accessible, warm and friendly, he does not play the smoke card. “For me, a child of Sabathé, Montpellier is a club which has always dominated in front to win its matches. We are not the Stade Toulouse, for example. We are not a team capable of imposing itself if it does not not dominate. Above all, compared to our squad, we had to be on defense. The top six last year in defense are the top six in the general ranking. That’s why I have Geoffrey Doumayrou on my team. sides Because. that he will soon be one of the best French coaches in terms of defense. That’s it, I needed to be supported by him to create our project.” He summarizes as follows: “We will defend well, be good on carried balls, good in touch, good in scrums and then, we will see. I admit, Benoît Paillaugue is currently eating his black bread. But we must understand that building an offensive project means is hypercomplicated and, given our means, we chose our style. We know that we had strong pillars and number 5s. So, we play in a certain way, but it wins. And I have the feeling that the supporters are following us But if we want to settle permanently in the top 6, we will have to evolve. Benoît Paillaugue’s time will come…”
To support his point, he cites a match in particular, a defeat at that: 9 to 6 in Bordeaux, on November 30, a paradoxical masterpiece for a team in reconstruction: “We did everything strategically to leave them as little space as possible, to avoid their ability to play duels and avoid the talent of Bielle-Biarrey, the lucidity of their hinge which sees free spaces. I told my players to be above all annoying. Let the opponent say to himself: “Montpellier is a mess…”“.
Laporte as a shield
His former teammate Vassili Bost, whom he knew as a resident of the MHR training center, saw him evolve without surprise: “I thought he would be a coach. It’s no surprise. Johan loved analyzing the game, he was an exceptional technician. And he was someone who, through his psychology, always led men. He was often captain of the teams he played for. We agreed on the fact that rugby starts in front. Either way, he was a big fighter. Because of his small size, he scratched all the balls.”
Joan Caudullo therefore succeeded in the first part of her bet. And Bernard Laporte, of whom he was not historically close, is the first to recognize this: “He brought serenity. He’s a calm and lucid guy. He makes all his staff live well, he’s the opposite of an authoritarian guy.” The testimony agrees with the echoes coming from the GGL Stadium. Caudullo does not crush or suffocate his collaborators. He doesn’t hide much from those who work alongside him. “I do participatory management. We look at the images together and everyone gives their opinion. I give the floor a lot. I have a lot of meetings, my staff sometimes criticizes me for it. For me, everything must be in place, it’s the union minimum. Everyone must know where they’re going, but I have the last word because I’m the one who goes in front of the players.”
Between the fiery Laporte and the level-headed Caudullo, a mode of operation has established itself: the former participates in the morning meetings and is content to observe the sessions. But besides, is it a problem for Caudullo to work with a “monument” like the man from Gaillac? “He is the best French technician in terms of results. He left his mark on a whole generation. When we want to recruit young people, I tell him: “The young people, I don’t know if they know you, but in any case the parents, they respect you enormously. So you are important in these meetings.” I’m leaning a little towards that… I think Bernard gave me the place I deserved. He told me: “There you are, the person responsible is you. If there is a problem, you are the one who will be attacked. So I am with you. I am your shield, I will help you.” And frankly, today, that’s the case. We had difficult times. He was there with me, he didn’t let me go. He advised me when it was necessary.”
We would tend to compare the approach of the coach to that of the player he was, a basic hooker, untouched by any selection: “But in the under-20s, I was third row! I only became a hooker afterwards… I still played in a university selection match. I also received, once, a letter for France A, a sort of pre-convocation among sixty players.” He was not the man to pursue fantasy rugby, everything brought him back to the pragmatic dimension of our time on earth. “I think I had the career I deserved. I didn’t have any extraordinary qualities, I was small, I wasn’t the best technically, I wasn’t a very good thrower but I I was going very quickly for my position When Montpellier started to regularly play the top 6, it became difficult. Fabien Galthié told me that I was not the man to stay on the side, since I was the leader. locker room. Yes, I loved it, it’s true that I was a locker room leader, with a taste for reflection. Very quickly, I was making videos on my matches, I was working on strategy. I loved it. .”
Reading his CV, we almost forgot that he had left his hometown to spend seven years in Mont-de-Marsan, his second home. “A different atmosphere. There, we were recognized in the street. I lived there for many good years and I took responsibility for the training center there. That’s where I met the Bécognée, De Nardi, Banos, Coly.” Building on his budding second career, Xavier Garbajosa contacted him for a magnificent return home. He confides, his objective was to find an MHR as Hérault as possible, more than that of the 2022 title, even if he does not deny it. An MHR closer to the one he experienced in 2011, when the club reached its first Top 14 final under the leadership of a certain Fabien Galthié. An innovative team, which brought the game to France in waves. “With forwards who stayed in the middle of the field, the 1-3-3-1. I loved it straight away, it built me as a coach. It’s true that when Fabien arrived , I noted a lot of things, he saw it.” Fourteen years later, the student has not yet equaled the master, but the two men are in the same corporation and are likely to have to discuss the fitness of this or that player, prepared by one and selected by the other.
