Mathieu Bastareaud says stop, the last charge of a French rugby character

Sunday May 28, when the siren will sound at the Mayol stadium, Mathieu Bastareaud will savor his last moments as a professional rugby player. A career that will have taken him very high very early on, before sending him back very quickly very low, but which he will have concluded by having rubbed shoulders with the heights of rugby. He can boast of having gleaned 54 selections with the XV of France, a Grand Slam, three consecutive Champions Cup, a Brennus shield and a European Challenge. Above all, he will leave behind him an indelible mark in the history of French rugby.

A child of Val-de-Marne and Créteil, where he completed all his pre-training, Mathieu Bastareaud skipped the stages. Especially when, then a Massy player in Federal 1, he was called up to the France team by Bernard Laporte, at 18 and without ever having evolved into a professional. Member of the France pole at the Marcoussis National Rugby Center, he is already out of place and does not leave anyone indifferent.

The coach of the XV of France, after seeing him at work during set-ups, gets caught up in the game. As a result, Bastareaud is called for a tour of New Zealand. Benoît Bonetti, who shared his youthful years at Massy by his side, says: “At the time, it was pretty crazy, it wasn’t really framed, it was more of a UFO.“A knee injury during the final stages with Massy will prevent him from flying off to the Kiwis, but his story with the XV of France has already begun.

A story that resumed in 2009, when he participated in the Six Nations Tournament under the thumb of Marc Liévremont. A tour of New Zealand follows, finally. After a victory in Dunedin against the All Blacks, where he started, everything seemed to be going well for Bastareaud. But the fall is terrible. Following a drunken evening after a new match against the Blacks in which he did not participate, Bastareaud made his biggest youthful mistake. Damaged in the face following a fall in his room, he invents an attack on returning to his hotel. The case takes a phenomenal scale. Especially when we learn that he was not attacked. The media and politicians do not forgive him, he is drowned in the middle of a whirlwind that goes beyond the world of rugby. At 21, he can’t stand it and tries to kill himself.

Life resumed its course. Bastareaud took care of himself. “He had a lot of courage and resilience. He made a round back on everything that happened in New Zealand in particular.“, confides Benoit Bonetti. He also became one of the first French sportsmen to publicly evoke depression, in his book (Head held high: Confessions of a terrible child of rugby, published in 2015) but also on television.

With the XV of France too, life resumed. After being sanctioned, he is recalled by the coach for the next Tournament. France achieves the Grand Slam, “Basta” holds in four of the five games. The sequel is less linear and sees its playing time fluctuate. He remains a member of the group on a regular basis and participates in the 2015 World Cup. But the story ends in great frustration. Leader of Jacques Brunel’s group, he is not traveling to Japan in 2019. The French team does without a “game changer”, but it seems above all to leave behind one of its base men.

A real ball player able to unlock a match

Throughout his career, Mathieu Bastareaud has looked the 120 kg bar in the eye. Prohibitive for the post of center for some. For Vincent Clerc, best try scorer in the history of the XV of France and former teammate, it is “these rare profiles that combine power, speed and the will to make those around him play“. So much more than a simple defense fixing point. Today in charge of the Massy training center, Benoît Bonetti emphasizes the style of a player who is more knowledgeable than “nag”. “He feels the game. He is a sports enthusiast in general, who has a lot of thoughts about rugby and who has often been able to reinvent himself. […] He has always been very good on technical games.“

“I remember that in a match with the French pole, we crossed, he played his duel and he crossed the field for 50m. There the people who doubted his physique said to themselves, “ah yeah, the pillar-hooker is able to do that” He was a guy but he still had gas.”

Benoît Bonetti, former teammate of Mathieu Bastareaud

at franceinfo: sport

If he establishes himself as one of the best players in the championship with Stade Français from 2007 to 2011, Bastareaud needs a change of scenery. Leave Paris and its potential nocturnal distractions too. “He realized after a while that for his development, it might be interesting for him to move” admits Benoît Bonetti. And then the child of Créteil arrives on the Rade, in Toulon. There, Bastareaud will build an extraordinary track record until 2019. This will also allow him to bring rugby to France, by becoming its main figure, its absolute star, in the same way as a Chabal or than a Michalak a few years earlier.

In 2020, he leaves to play in the United States. A shortened experience across the Atlantic since it was interrupted by the Covid-19, but which testifies to his desire to experience rugby in all its forms and developments. Consequences ? Mathieu Bastareaud returns to Lyon, alongside a Pierre Mignoni who has the gift of having convinced him more than once to put on his crampons again and again.

Unfortunately for him, things don’t go as planned and he has a string of injuries. A rupture of the quadriceps tendon of the left knee, followed by a fracture of the hand and especially a double rupture of the quadriceps tendon, on the same action. Both knees are affected and the scene has something dramatic. The next day, he announced on his networks that he needed a “reflection time” as to the rest of his career. The following months are difficult, but he goes back to fighting and not just anywhere. Last September, the one who now plays number 8 returns to La Rade, at home.

Pierre Mignoni joined the staff of the RCT and it is difficult not to link the arrival of Bastareaud to his presence. In the opinion of all, the current co-trainer of Toulon is perhaps the main architect of the years of rab that Bastareaud has given himself. Whether it’s for Vincent Clerc, “it starts from Peter“, or for Benoît Bonetti, “Mignoni was brilliant on that, he knows Basta perfectly“, all are unanimous.

A player appreciated and respected beyond France

But Mathieu Bastareaud, it’s not just the field. He is unanimous everywhere he goes. “He is someone with a very endearing temperament, he has become a friend. He is very altruistic and that’s why I think he federates around him” relates Vincent Clerc. Same story with his friend Benoît Bonetti, “he always had a great state of mind, very fair play, respectful in general.” He also recalls that he does not have his tongue in his pocket for all that and “he is not one of those who say and do things to please“.”Mathieu, either you love him or you hate himconfided his former teammate at Stade Français, Mathieu Blin, in the Canal + documentary “Basta”. Usually, if you like him, you know him, if you hate him, you don’t know him.“

Bernard Laporte also testified to Canal + that some of his executive players were even trying to find out if he would be on the match sheet. “I remember, Jonny Wilkinson, Matt Giteau, when we talked a bit about line-up, when the big games were coming, they wanted to know if he was going to be there“. Jonny Wilkinson who will even sign the preface to his book, calling himself “privileged” to have been his teammate and designating Mathieu Bastareaud as one of his sources of inspiration.

For the one who will have started in nine of the ten finals he has played in, the end of his sporting career means the arrival of new challenges. Indeed, he should become Team Manager of the RCT and should therefore still survey the spans of Mayol.