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Top 14: Stade Rochelais must hoist the mainsail

2023-02-16T12:54:09.003Z


Already beaten three times at home this season in the league, the Maritimes must reap on the road. It starts this Saturday in Castres...


It is a record which the European champions would have done without.

Since their rise in the elite, in 2014, they had never conceded more than two defeats in their den of Deflandre.

Losing to LOU two weeks ago, they are now three losses away at home (after Pau and UBB) and are getting closer to the waterline.

If Stade Rochelais is still in the qualified position (4th), it has only 4 points ahead of the 9th, RC Toulon.

To discover

  • Fixtures and Top 14 results

  • Ranking Top 14

Suffice to say that nine days before the end of the regular season, they will have to struggle hard to recover far from their land these points lost at the port.

The answer will quickly come as the Rochelais are preparing to travel three times over the next four days.

However, they have shown that they are capable of it by returning victorious four times already this season.

Danny back?

The takeover operation begins this Saturday (5 p.m.) in Castres.

A particularly hostile land.

The Tarnais are on a series of 29 matches without defeat at home (28 wins and a draw, two days ago, against Racing 92).

And their position in the standings (11th) gives them no room for error in front of their public.

Let us add that La Rochelle has only won Castres once in eight Top 14 confrontations, and we can better measure the extent of the challenge that awaits the Rochelais.

European champions who have the greatest difficulty in making people forget the absences of their Blues, whether they are selected (Grégory Alldritt, Uini Atonio, now suspended, and Reda Wardi) or injured (Jonathan Danty, Pierre Bourgarit).

The imminent return of their powerful center - victim of a rupture of the posterior cruciate ligament of the knee on December 31 last in Perpignan, Danty could apply for this trip to Castres - will not be too much...

We take huge waves, there are holes in the boat.

Some are in the water.

I hope we get them back…

 ”

Ronan O'Gara

Will Irish manager Ronan O'Gara's warning be heeded?

After the home defeat against LOU (16-20), two weeks ago, he too had spun the maritime metaphor.

We take huge waves, there are holes in the boat.

Some are in the water.

I hope we will get them back…

” And continue.

In the short term, something has to change quickly.

It's a bit of the last dance, there are nine matches left.

When there is will, everything is possible, where there is will, there is a way.

If there is no will…

Its captain, the faithful Romain Sazy, had also supported where it hurts.

Between not being far from winning and winning… The balance sheet, in the end, is not good.

(…) We are not going to talk a lot, take a week off to regenerate and above all come back with many intentions.

I hope it will make us react well, that we will ask ourselves the right questions and come back after the holidays with a different state of mind, much more involvement, ”warned the third

row from La Rochelle.

Time is indeed running out.

Stade Rochelais have lost four of their last six Top 14 matches. A pace that could sink the European champions...

Source: lefigaro

All sports articles on 2023-02-16

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