Ariège amateur rugby trophies: vote for the best player

They are back! The amateur rugby trophies organized by The Midi Dispatchin partnership with the Ariège departmental rugby committee, are back for their third edition. To celebrate the players of this 2023/2024 season, marked by great sporting successes in our department, it is through the presentation of numerous prizes that each cog in the discipline will be celebrated.

Today, let’s take a look at the best players in the department. There are four nominees and one of them will try, thanks to your votes, to become the winner of these amateur rugby trophies version 2024. The jury has decided to put three teammates who play under the colors of the club Les Rambailleuses d’Ariège in competition. Here they are: Cassandra Lagarde, Mariam De Macedo and Lucie Roudière.

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Cassandra Lagarde (Rambailleuses d’Ariège): “I lost two nails on the only try I scored”

Cassandra’s background is unusual. The 22-year-old discovered rugby through friendship: “My passion for rugby didn’t come from my family but from a friend (Anna Laguerre) who told me to come and try. And so I left for Oust. Until then, I watched rugby by going to see my uncle at the ASB, my cousin at rugby league or on TV. We were more of a “football” family. During the mowing (she comes from a family of farmers), at the end of the day, it was a football match”. Having switched to rugby, Cassandra went from training to training, much to the despair of her grandmother who, today, wouldn’t miss a single match at home, or even away.

Cassandra completed all her studies in Foix before working at the only agricultural cooperative in Ariège, CAPA. It was this job that led to her first steps in the world of rugby, when she met Anna Laguerre. Since then, she has worked there as a technical sales representative in animal production.

Three years ago, during the last year of the Rambailleuses at 10, Cassandra discovered a great group of friends. This group and the coaches allowed her to evolve, to feel more confident. “For the touches, at the beginning, I looked like the inflatable man. However, not everything has evolved positively with the helmet or the headband! In addition, I play second row, which often makes people laugh. Let’s say that I don’t really look like the second rows, big and strong. Last year, during the only try I scored in a friendly match, I lost two nails”. In the club, despite what she says, Cassandra is a major element of the team.

Mariam De Macedo (Rambailleuses d’Ariège): “I growl in the rucks”

Mariam grew up in Arignac, near Tarascon-sur-Ariège, where she was born. Her father is a player of the UST XV, her uncles, her brother and her cousins ​​are also. She grew up around and on the magnificent Moulin-Neuf stadium. She played for a year in poussin when her papou, protector, found this sport too dangerous for his little “pounette”. Mariam then went through GRS, volleyball, judo, swimming, hip-hop to satisfy her passion for sport but without really clicking. It was at 18 that she returned to rugby, thanks to the meeting of Laura Serrano, a “Rambailleuse” with whom she was in class at high school. Major and determined, she returned to this sport that makes her vibrate.

A winger at the start, Mariam quickly changed positions and moved to the third row wing. She also played a few games in scrum-half, at UA Saverdun. In terms of studies, she obtained a Bac STMG, a BTS tourism, a DDTECET degree and finally obtained a CAP cuisine two years ago and a complementary mention in restaurant desserts. Following the closure of the establishment where she worked, she decided to open her own restaurant in Tarascon-sur-Ariège. “My goals are clear: to offer locals and tourists alike a warm place, where people enjoy meeting up and sharing over a good meal.”

To conclude, an anecdote: “The girls often point out to me that during matches, I growl in the rucks to try to get the girl out. This little ritual gives me the impression of being “stronger” but the results are not always conclusive.”

Lucie Roudière (Rambailleuses d’Ariège): rugby in her genes

From a young age, Lucie Roudière has been on the sidelines of the pitch. “To encourage my dad, my uncles, my cousins ​​and my brother,” she sums up. “One day, my dad, who was a coach, came back from training and said to me: ‘Lulu, tonight a girl came to try rugby and this girl is your age’.” Without further ado, Lucie Roudière threw herself into the rugby adventure at the age of 11 at the Couserans rugby school. She was quickly selected for the Haute-Garonne selection, which allowed her to join the Toulouse women’s rugby center, in Jolimont.

There, she spent two years combining sports and studies, where she learned her trade as a hairdresser. “On weekends, I played in the Fonsorbes club and, at the same time, I was in the Midi-Pyrénées selection. During these two wonderful years, we won two French championship titles: 7-a-side and XV-a-side,” says Lucie.

After her studies, she stopped playing rugby for a year due to lack of time. She resumed in the Pays Sud Toulousain where her uncle was a coach and her cousins ​​were players. The adventure lasted two years because the trips between her Couserans and the club had become more and more tiring. Lucie made her comeback with the Rambailleuses d’Ariège last year, where she is now a player-coach, while she had stopped playing rugby for more than 4 years following a KO in 2019.