Bernard Goutta has never hidden it, he is hyperactive. Staying quietly on his sofa is not written in the genes of the Catalan who will celebrate his 52nd birthday on September 28. The former manager of SU Agen (January 2022-December 2023) has still not relapsed. Approached by Montauban last April, then Biarritz and Lyon, the former third row has sharpened all the offers. “I closed doors. It was ambiguous, the projects did not interest me.” The coach, champion of France with Perpignan in 2009, assures us: “I am still waiting to work with a professional rugby club.”
In the meantime, Bernard Goutta is not inactive, even if the last few months have not been easy to live through. “There have been some difficult times. This is the first off-season that I have not had in thirty-two years. It’s strange not to work in July and August. These are important moments in a team’s season.” A defeat at Armandie against Montauban (22-26) last December deprived him of this pleasure, as he ended his contract with the SUA which ran until 2026. “I have been unemployed for two months.” With the work on his house completed and the osteoarthritis in his right knee treated, he needed new projects.
RCBB by passion
The man with 298 matches under the Usap jersey had warned in February: “I feel that nature is taking over again.” He was not the only one. “I am very friendly with the butcher of Bon-Encontre who is also in the management team of the RCBB. It is through him that I will have an advisory role in the club.” Bernard Goutta will therefore not be returning to the field immediately, nor to a bench. He was this Sunday in the stands of the Lajunie stadium to watch the victory of RC Bon-Encontre/Boé (28-10) in the derby against Nérac. “I will watch all the RCBB matches to make an assessment.”
“I’m reaching an age where I have to give back what I’ve been given.”
He mainly aims to set up the famous transversality of the youngest to the senior team to create a “navy and green” club identity in search of a rebound after its relegation to Fédérale 3. “In a voluntary and passionate way, I want to help my village club where I am very well integrated.” So his ambition to become a regional or departmental technical manager is forgotten. “I want visibility and at the moment there is not much at the level of the Federation. I am happy here [NDLR : il a toujours une fille scolarisée à Agen]. My next project will also be a family project.” The good news is that there is no shortage of them.
A double project
Deprived of rugby fields, Bernard Goutta returned to school. He is following two training courses in parallel with the BGE Lot-et-Garonne in Agen and the Afdas via videoconference. “The first training course concerns business creation. I am going to set up my own company to become a corporate speaker in order to share my management experience and my life journey. The other idea for a career change is my number 1 project: setting up a structure to go to working-class neighborhoods in big cities and bring young people into rugby. The idea is to go there once a week to help them progress physically and technically and to direct them to a club.”
This is not just a professional project for Bernard Goutta. For him, it is also about coming full circle: “I would never have become a rugby player if there had not been a volunteer educator who had come to get me in my neighborhood and made me want to play rugby. I am reaching an age where I have to give back what I have been given.” With his business plan completed, the market study confirms that “town halls are asking” for such an action. He also plans to extend it to prisons. “I want to pass on my experience and my life.” This is what he is already doing with the Moroccan selection that he joined a few months ago (read elsewhere).
As for the SUA, he has indeed turned the page: “I haven’t watched the matches, even if I look at the results and what is being said. I have members of staff and players who call me, it makes me happy to hear them. But I don’t want to talk rugby with them and even less about the SUA.”
Appointment
With Morocco in Agen. Bernard Goutta will return to the Stade Armandie. Committed “voluntarily” until November with the Moroccan national team, the former SUA manager will participate in a training course planned in Agen on September 27, 28 and 29. “This selection had been excluded from World Rugby for four years, it is a project that is restarting. There are new leaders, great energy and great motivation. We are trying to structure training and get closer to what is done at the highest level. I am focusing on defense and general organization. There are a lot of things to put in place with a team that has not competed for four years. We have two matches in November to reach Group A in order to then claim to qualify for the World Cup.”
. Projects, training, “advisor” at RCBB, the new life of Bernard Goutta){kind=link}