Stade Français - Perpignan will play well this Saturday at 7 p.m. at the Jean-Bouin stadium. The PCR tests passed by the Parisian players on Thursday allow the match of the 14th day of the Top 14 to take place as planned. Nothing was certain, however, until the last moment. Since the announcement of the postponement of its match in Toulouse last Sunday when the workforce was about to board at Orly (several players had tested positive for Covid-19), the Stade Français has lived in uncertainty. He only resumed training on Wednesday after a first battery of negative tests. He was waiting for the return of the second session of the tests, 48 hours before the meeting, as required by the new protocol established by the National League, to be sure of playing. It is therefore done.
Place now, just before the introduction of the gauges from January 3, in this duel between poorly classified (the 10th against the 13th) far from simple for the Parisians. With two games already postponed (Bristol in the Champions Cup and Toulouse in the TOP 14), they have not tasted the competition since December 12 and a large defeat against Connacht (36-9), and they will not that three days of training in the legs. “We had a truncated preparation this week, regretted Thursday assistant coach Julien Arias. There will inevitably be a small problem at this level. We tried to compensate for the last two days, even if we could not shoot too much on the bodies since the match is coming quickly. It is not easy to find the automatisms quickly.We will be at a disadvantage compared to Perpignan who was able to play a big game last weekend against Castres (20-19 loss at home on Sunday), and who will surely be more developed physically.
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On what he showed during his victory against La Rochelle (25-20), his last Top 14 match on December 5, the Stade Français has no complex to do however.
“We are still top-level athletes,” underlines scrum-half Arthur Coville.
We didn't stop for three months either.
During preseason, we stop for longer than that.
The Parisians even hope to take advantage of this long forced rest.
“It also feels good at this point in the season to be able to relax a bit,” said Arias.
It can be a good thing.
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