This time they didn’t do it again. Castres had experienced a delay in ignition in the semi-final against Toulouse before reversing the situation and winning his ticket for the final. Against Montpellier, Friday June 24 at the Stade de France, the huge slump at the start of the match (0-20 after 21 minutes) was fatal to the Tarnais. Loudly shouting behind the score, Pierre-Henry Broncan’s men let the Brennus slip away before they could even really dream of it.
“We made a complicated start to the matchreacted to our microphone Castres captain Mathieu Babillot. We attack and behind our lost balls, they manage to score and it’s very, very hard. So I don’t mind, we hang on, we have our values which are strong. But in a final, a high level match and with such intensity, it does not forgive. We are going way too far.“
Castres also quickly found himself orphaned by the Argentinian Benjamin Urdapilleta, touched in the quarter of an hour of play.That’s not an excusedecided Babillot. In any position, we have guys on the bench who are fresh and ready to bring, it has worked all season, so we are not going to spit in the soup tonight, it does not look like us.“
Without its home striker, dominated in intensity as in creativity, the CO did not know how to conclude its beautiful year in the best possible way, with a first place during the regular season, but without a trophy. The second period full of self-sacrifice and the test for the honor of Vilimoni Botitu will remain anecdotal. Loïc Jacquet, who bowed out after this match, accused the blow in the mixed zone. “On the match, there is no photo. When you see the score, the face of the match… You can’t have any regrets. They were better than us. It’s a huge sadness for everyone.”
Like Jacquet, Rory Kockott also lived his last emotions as a player, although absent from the match sheet, he was one of the heroes of the Castres coronations of 2013 and 2018. “That’s not how I wanted to end my career, but I loved French culture, I enjoyed life here, released the former scrum half of the XV of France on Canal +. The victory of 2013 is a memory that no one will take away from me.“
This memory now seems far away for a largely renewed group. The Pierre-Henry Broncan era has only just begun, and Mathieu Babillot sees in this 2022 final the first milestones laid by his training, which has seen the emergence of several talents from amateur rugby in recent months. “I am very proud of the grouphe assured with a smile. Even if tonight, the end is not the one hoped for, we have an incredible group. We will learn, we have a group that still has a lot to work on. We’ll recover well, we’ll go back to work with sharp teeth.”