“Since the night of the defeat, I have been at work”

Is the despondency still present after this heavy defeat for UBB in the final against Toulouse (59-3)?

I’m not going to tell you that I’m happy, but I’m never down for very long. Friday night, I was unhappy and sad. But my temperament is to hang on. I know that high-level sport is even harder than business. We’ve taken a lot of hits over the past sixteen years, we’ve always taken them. My nature is to say to myself: “That’s where we are. What analysis do we make of the situation? What should we improve? And how do we do it?” In general, we find a lot of motivation in failures. Since the night of the defeat, I’ve been working, at least in my head, to find sources of improvement with Yannick (Bru, the manager).

What comes out of all this?

The observation, and all French rugby shares it, is that we are facing a Stade Toulousain which has been strong for 40 years. It’s like a business that’s going well, little by little, it improves the little details and it becomes a steamroller. On top of that, they have an exceptional generation, surely the best team France has ever had, and the best player in the world of all time, who also arrived fresh as a roach in this final.

This was not the case with UBB…

There was the World Cup, the Tournament… The number of players requested at the UBB is abnormal. On top of that, we played the Champions Cup hard, the Top 14 is harder every year. To still manage to play a Champions Cup quarter-final and a Top 14 final through the play-offs, I say to myself that it’s a hell of a season. Afterwards, on the final, there was no more fuel in the engine…

The score of this final doesn’t tarnish everything?

Of course it spoils things a bit for us. But we can’t stop there. I can see the fair play of the Toulouse team and the many messages we can receive. Yes, the score is heavy. But everyone tells us that we had a great season, that we are improving. We mustn’t dwell on this final, we have to move on.

Isn’t the gap with Stade Toulousain too big to bridge?

It’s not that big. We’re in the final against them, they have the first training center, we have the second… We’re on their heels everywhere. They’ve taken a big lead because they started a long time ago. We have to work hard. More than them. I’m not jealous of them. Successful people have always inspired me.

UBB managed to reach the semi-finals. The next step to hope to reach the end is to obtain a qualification while avoiding a jump-off?

Yes, we can see that to try to win a title, it is better to avoid a jump-off. This season, we had to play three final phase matches in twelve days. That alone doesn’t put you in a favorable position to go to the end. So we have to hope to finish in the top 2. But before starting the next season, we will especially try to finish in the top 6 because it risks being another nuclear war (laughs).

UBB had a better squad than last season but to win a Brennus, don’t you need two like that?

I’m not convinced that the squad was much better than last year. He has improved a little. But I believe that our young people confirmed and the staff did an excellent job, they made this group progress. The squad will be a little better next year, but we will still have to work to say that we are equipped to go to the end. Without insulting our forwards, we must add quality to the pack. But with Bochaton, Gazzotti, Depoortere, Bielle-Biarrey… we have a beautiful generation that all presidents dream of having. They have quality, an impeccable state of mind. It gives a lot of confidence. But we must continue to be relevant in recruitment. It is neither a good president, nor a good manager, nor a good commercial director who makes the difference in a club. Recruitment is key.

Are you going to take a real step forward at this level for the 2025-2026 season?

Take this quality group as it is today, it will still improve next season but not in a very significant way yet. Is it enough to win? Maybe not. So we target. I know from experience that we have to anticipate as much as possible.

Where are the discussions to extend Matthieu Jalibert (contract ends in June 2025)?

Matthieu has a proposal which he has not followed up on for the moment. The ball is in his court.

What did Yannick Bru’s new staff bring this season?

Many things. First of all, there is a state of mind, everyone is on the same wavelength. There is kindness, humility, solidarity. And there is experience. The more we advanced in the season, the better I found Yannick, especially when we attacked the final stages. All his speeches and decisions were very relevant. I felt the experience. And on a more technical level, this staff allowed us to progress in certain phases of play, particularly in terms of offensive organization.

“The idea is to say that we are going to give ourselves even more resources gradually”

What do you expect from next season?

You always want to do so well. But we won’t make finals every year, we shouldn’t dream, it’s impossible. Only Toulouse can claim that. Today, we can only talk about the top 6. Afterwards, we will see how the season goes but there will still be eleven or twelve clubs with arguments to enter the six. It’s still going to take a lot of energy. The idea is to tell ourselves that we will gradually give ourselves even more resources. And our results must improve compared to our previous cycles. I want to be ambitious but not pretentious.

UBB is one of the rare clubs with Toulouse and La Rochelle not to end up in the red financially. What does this inspire you?

It’s interesting to see that these are three clubs that are very anchored in their city and their department, that are on the real economy, even if sometimes, I was able to be a patron president. The last three years have been good for the UBB because there has been a lot of help and solidarity from partners. The real budget, without exceptional aid, is that of next season. And we are hopeful of reaching balance. And then, we will be on a real economy without external elements. It is a great satisfaction because if we finally manage to bring the UBB to balance, it is a real step forward to stabilize the club in the long term. But all this is only possible by maintaining the level of sporting results. We are launching our subscription campaign, we have the feeling that we are going to smash our record. We need all this to perpetuate the club.

And also

” South West “. On newsstands, a 32-page special edition looks back at the UBB’s 2023-2024 season.
Guest of TV7. Laurent Marti will be the guest on the show “Top Rugby” this evening (7 p.m.) on the TV7 channel.