L’Rowing Bayonne
is master at Jean Dauger. After bringing down Racing then UBB, it’s La Rochelle
which fell this Saturday, October 8 on the occasion of the sixth day of Top 14
. The reactions after the meeting of opener Camille Lopez, third line Afa Amosa and manager Grégory Patat.
Camilla Lopez: “The most successful performance? I don’t think so. Another big one that falls at home, we take it. We beat the European champion at home. But there are still a lot of details that are wrong. We have to “We are even more demanding of ourselves. We can control things even more, especially in the second half. When we took the score, we have possessions where we drop the ball. We didn’t know keep this possession. It would have been even better to have a better grip. We are demanding even if you had given me the paper, we would have signed immediately at the bottom of the page before the match for a victory […] We can’t afford to aim for anything other than maintenance. We know that our fight is maintenance. But beat the big teams at home, we take. We took three matches and the points that go with it, but there is still a long way to go. It will have to be taken outside.
We take barrels all afternoon. They run over you. But we faced up. It was a key point of the game. We were efficient and pragmatic. Faced with big teams like that, it’s very important. Now, we must be more serene, have possession […] The turf war was super important today. We had identified him. We figured it out pretty well. Gaetan (Germain) masters it to perfection, it does us a lot of good with its length. Max (Machenaud) also made a very good kicking game on the match.
“We are going to live through complicated times, I am sure of it. The whole club will have to remain united: players, extra-sports, offices, a whole city, the supporters.”
-Camille Lopez
The 4th decisive pass at the foot of the season? “That one, she is more of the right! The opportunity presents itself like this. It closes in front of me. We have an advantage. I risk nothing. At worst, we return to the penalty. It’s all bonus for us. We try, it works. I have the rebound which comes back in the hands of Gaëtan. It’s a kick ass. We take ! The goal is to fake the pass to bring it up. Otherwise, it’s to send it quickly by hand outside because there was a space. It goes up strongly, so we slide behind, after, there is the rebound which is going well.
On the end stage when it comes out? “I take, I know the fervor that there was in this club, I came here for that. We live good times because we win. The public does us good. Being sold out every weekend ends when we receive, it pushes us, it galvanizes us, it will help us. The path to the Top 14 is very, very long. We are going to live through complicated times, I am sure of it. We will necessarily have a complicated passage, or this will be tough. The whole club will have to stick together: players, extra-sports, the offices… A whole club, a city, the supporters who must stick together. If we stick together, we will stand up.”
Afa Amosa: “All the matches are important. We are a team that has just climbed into the Top 14, we want to build something, whatever the matches, even if outside, we have not yet found the key to winning. But as they say: the work is not finished, and we must continue to work every week. If we can get close to the top six, good for us. The most important thing is that with the players of experience, you can build something.”
At halftime, we said to ourselves that we had to make war on them.
-Afa Amosa
“The key was up front. La Rochelle are a very big team. Uini (Atonio)Big Will (Skelton), and the other players arrived, the whole pack is doing a great job of making it easier for their backs. They have formed a great team this season and we had to respond. We had focused the work on the balls carried, taking them to their game. We started badly at the start with this test conceded. At halftime, we said to ourselves that we had to wake up and that we had to make war against them. We found the energy in the second half, we put our heads together, to play as a team. The team responded present, throughout the week, we prepared for this match. It’s a victory not only for the 23 players, but also for those outside the group, the hopefuls who come to train with us all week.”
Gregory Patat: “We had a strategy in place, especially on the occupation of the field with a deep foot game, to be able to push back these Rochelais. We knew that only Kerr-Barlow was able to respond in front in this duel from a distance, at the foot. We succeeded from this point of view, to hurry them, to keep them in their camp. We managed to make interesting defensive sequences, with very low tackles which made it possible to stifle this La Rochelle team. We must congratulate the players, Maxime Machenaud, Camille Lopez, Gaëtan Germain, they realized what we had said before. We knew that despite everything they were going to cause us problems in the balls carried. We knew that the lack of Antoine Hastoy and Brice Dulin was going to be detrimental.
We mastered our subject and the La Rochelle machine had no plan B. I quickly saw signals in the first half, La Rochelle heads down, without a solution. They had quite a negative body language and that’s exactly where we wanted to take them. Under pressure, without solution. And in this sport, whatever the team, when you’re under pressure and you don’t have the weapons to rectify that, it’s usually the scrum, the balls carried, it becomes difficult.. . because we competed pretty well in these phases.”
“We may have sent a small signal that it would be complicated to come and win with us.”
– Gregory Patat
“Since the start of the season, we have had a quality: we are very pragmatic, on the few balls we have, conservation and possession, we play fair. Like the start of the second half where the “we scored twice. But where we were very good, better than in our last outings, it was in this ability to keep them under pressure throughout the match. Apart from the area of the offensive touch, I think that “There are a lot of things that have been positive. Today, we saw a team that was able to master its subject over the entire duration of the match. And that’s it, that’s important.”
“This championship is complicated enough to claim victory too soon. The team is building, growing and advancing little by little. We knew it was going to be a match of a different ilk than against Bordeaux and Racing, we had talked about it all week. We knew it was going to be, maybe twice as intense, and we managed to meet the challenge. Now, it’s far from being an end. We don’t project ourselves at all on any result or objective. Our objective is to advance in this championship, to do things well to stay in the Top 14, and we once again sent a small signal that it would be difficult to come and win with us. … With this atmosphere in the stadium, you can’t miss this type of match.”
“Camille came for a project: to grow Rowing, he is 100% dedicated to this task.”
– Gregory Patat
Lopez’s performance? “Camille came for a project: to make rowing grow, he is 100% dedicated to this task. Like his performance, he makes the team and his teammates grow. Thanks to his experience, he has an extraordinary quality of play and he plays close to the line, he is able to find a teammate in a small space with these initiatives and he plays fair. It is not trivial this notion of pragmatism that we develop at the slightest opportunity. He is able to see spaces and give balloons, caviars for his teammates. We are lucky to have him, he is a great leader. Now he has had good soldiers by his side and the whole team is to be congratulated on this performance.”
“Beat La Rochelle? It’s always fun to beat a big guy. Frankly, with La Rochelle, I only have very good memories. But of course that tonight, it was only Rowing that counted. J I have friends on the opposing team, but there is no personal satisfaction, no revenge, or more than that. There may be one with a certain person, but that’s all .”
“Important to win with our young people, like Victor Hannoun… he confirms all the good we thought of him.”
– Gregory Patat
“Victor (Hanun) confirms the good that we thought of him compared to what he had displayed in pre-season on a daily basis. Today, he was delighted to see the balloons pass in one direction and leave in the other. He ran and he multiplied the tasks. On every action, he was effective. It’s encouraging to see that in this Bayonne project, there are experienced players, there are Pro D2 players, but we mustn’t forget the young people who train daily with our means and that’s something important to me when we send such a message of knowing how to win with our young people. It is also a positive point tonight. And congratulations to him because he discovers this championship. He had the chance to play such a match, but he knew how to seize the opportunity.”