Montpellier will be entitled to a third attempt! Never crowned in the Top 14, beaten in the final in 2011 and 2018, the Hérault club qualified for the final of the French championship, where it will find Castres, beating Bègles-Bordeaux 19-10 with efficiency and thoroughness. Friday’s final at the Stade de France will therefore oppose the first two of the regular season, who have spared themselves the fatigue of the play-offs and have perhaps won their place on a breath of fresh air.
The Top 14 final will also be a replay of the 2018 final, when Castres beat Montpellier 29-13. Seven years earlier, in 2011, the Héraultais had been beaten by Toulouse. Winner of two European challenges, the club of billionaire Mohed Altrad is therefore still chasing a first shield from Brennus, but its place in the final is already a great reward for its manager Philippe Saint-André, who relaunched the club after a last season. to fight for maintenance.
These six points wrote the conclusion of this semi-final and definitively put their heads under water for the Béglo-Bordelais, who did not score a single point after the 17th minute. Starting at a very good pace, balanced and indecisive, before being much messier, the first period had already been rather Montpellier and the advantage of the MHR at the break (13-10) was not stolen. However, the first points of the match went to UBB via a penalty from Maxime Lucu, but from the next engagement, the Héraultais scored a good try by winger Vincent Rattez, served by Paolo Garbisi at the end of the line (6th , 7-3).
The other Montpellier points of the first period were scored on two drops. The players of Philippe Saint-André therefore made their phases of domination bear fruit while the Bordelais scored a happy try, recovering a ball lost by the hooker of the MHR Guilhem Guirado who had just dabbed three opponents.
At the time, Matthieu Jalibert’s first defensive kick looked like a save-and-go, but it ended up full axis in free space and turned into a try after a footballer’s ball drive from the Béglo-Bordeaux opener (16th). What followed was tense and suffocating, like the atmosphere in Nice, where the players were very hot. The two teams have thus long engaged in a battle of occupation kicks and a candlelight festival. But still, Montpellier defended very well and were never put out of position, with Aprasidze’s right foot then doing the rest.
