Top 14 – “Superpredator”: the editorial after Toulouse’s victory in the final

And to think that at the start of the season, the cards had to be redistributed for the legitimate reason of the very long absence of the internationals. On the Top 14 table, Stade Toulousain was going to eat its black bread – even more than all the others – by paying its contribution to the great national cause led by Fabien Galthié.

With one of the main favorites thus knocked to the ground by the World Cup, it is all the competition that we envisaged at the pinnacle when the championship became hyper competitive and uncertain until the end, instead of the traditional leveling by the low which operated during the “Mondial” years.

The rest, as you will have seen, would be of a confounding classicism. With Toulouse almost unbeatable in the final phase to hang on to the summits. With the others behind. The logic of the whole season flying into pieces during this crazy final experienced in Marseille, Friday evening, where the Red and Blacks blew up all the usual standards, sending the UBB and its line of 5-star three-quarters to the rank of stooges.

And while the magnitude of this historic score (59-3) must certainly be put into perspective, to soften the blow – these Bordeaux players did not deserve such humiliation – and the gap separating the two teams, there is nonetheless one implacable fact: this Stade Toulousain is out of the ordinary, a prototype never seen anywhere before at such a level of excellence, mastery and renewed desire. So count up to 23 Brennus Shields won by the Red and Black, with a third double since the creation of the European Cup in 1996. For the Dupont generation, this is a fifth title and already a “double-double”.

We will not harm the competition by placing the Ville Rose club at the top of the club rugby food chain, like a super predator that feeds on everything while leaving few crumbs for its opponents. Ultimate example with this season which, let’s come back to it, should have eluded him but which, on closer inspection, ultimately became the driving force behind a confusing motivation. First for the players: after the failure in the quarter-final of the 2023 World Cup, they found in this Champions Cup-Top 14 double the opportunity to wash away the insult and make history. Then, for the club: it has been able to transform itself to face new club-selection constraints and ever-increasing competition. As a result, the Stadium imposes a model at a pace that is difficult to follow if its economy catches up in terms of infrastructure.

The question remains: is this Stadium the strongest of all? In other words, has the myth become reality? The future will judge its power over time, and its capacity to adapt when it is necessary to assume the legacy left by this Lacroix-Mola-Dupont generation which is today untouchable.

One thing is certain, like the great Lourdes and Béziers in their time, like the Rouge et Noir armada of the 90s, this Toulouse Stadium considerably influences its era. He now dictates his convictions and arouses as much admiration as jealousy… These formidable engines for all the competition. May she never get exhausted and, on the contrary, become emboldened! A soap opera whose ending we know from the first episode would, without a doubt, be a bad omen for our Top 14.