"Fachico", hedgehog eaters Oval Masked pickles the final of Pro D2 Perpignan-Biarritz

The sun is coming back, the terraces are filling up, the Covid-19 is mysteriously disappearing... all the signs are there, it's the return of the endgame season! In the Top 14, 6 out of 14 clubs will have the right to compete for the Brennus shield, a well-deserved reward after 652 regular phase days and incredible suspense. This has also become Canal +'s main selling point: "Look at our product, there's suspense!" ". No sports, no games, just suspense.

But true rugby fans know that the best rugby is in Pro D2. This magical place where inbred villagers, psychotic South Africans and overweight Polynesians compete in contests that are sometimes messy, but always committed and spectacular. Here, no calendar overloaded by the Tournament or the European Cup. Here, no disproportionate sporting and financial stakes: apart from one or two clubs crazy enough to envy the fate of Agen and Bayonne, no one really wants to go up, so inevitably, the atmosphere is more relaxed.

This year, the two candidates for the ritual sacrifice of the promotion are called Usap and Biarritz. Two monuments of French rugby who plan to find the Elite. Two particular clubs, too. Because this duel is also that of the Gave family club against the city managed by Louis Alliot, the equivalent of an MMA fight in a cage between Eric Zemmour and Jean Messiha. We almost wonder why CNews did not buy the broadcasting rights. Finally, don't worry, you won't find any acerbic political commentary in this column: well aware that my audience is mainly made up of rugby players, I wouldn't take the risk of scaring them away by making vaguely leftist remarks.

Come on, let's go for the report of this #Fachico!

The composition of the champions

Thanks to @TuesdayRugby who gave me some thumbnails under the coat! (given the quality of some jokes you will understand that I needed help).

Film of the match

For those who did not watch the match, I remind you that the final was played at the GGL Stadium in Montpellier, under a blazing sun and in the presence of an audience present in limited numbers. So we find our support friends… Catalan partners, few in number, but who came with their traditional horns that they will not fail to honk for 80 minutes. Usap fans sometimes have a bad reputation. It is true that they are a bit like children: dirty, noisy, disrespectful and in bad faith. But at the same time, when they are not there at the family meal, we get bored a little. It is not the Biarritz supporters who will claim the opposite, especially since they all died of old age in 2008.

The two teams enter the field led by their captains: Steffon Armitage for the BO, Mathieu Acebes for Usap. We no longer present Armitage, multi-champion of Europe with the RCT and ephemeral English international. Acebes, for those unfamiliar with Pro D2's Jason Statham, he's a bit more of an old-school player. With a top speed of 11 km / h and a punching power lower than that of Damien Chouly, we can say that he is a good player without more. He is nevertheless essential to his team due to his charisma, his pugnacity and his leadership. And then we must above all recognize that it is scary. I sincerely hope that he cannot read, because if this little presentation offends him, the consequences could be unfortunate for me.

Before the start of the match, we have the right to La Marseillaise. For what ? Nobody knows, starting with the players who seem lost, between the many foreigners who wonder what they are doing there and the French who sing 12 seconds behind the sound system. Probably a revolutionary new idea from René Bouscatel, present in the stands with his usual friendly air.

After this awkward little moment, it's time for rugby! Well, moderately. I had said above that the Pro D2 was pleasant and fun to watch, but here we are in the presence of two teams who are having their job interview for the Top 14, so we feel that they want to show that they too can be boring. Between exchanges of kicks and faults of all kinds, this start to the match is very choppy.

We were waiting for all the exploits of Melvyn Jaminet. This rear capable of succeeding in 80m raises and slamming penalties of 55 does, it must be admitted, sometimes a bit of a task in Pro D2, as if a Ferrari found itself in the middle of the tractor show. But in the end, against all odds, it is a pillar that will make the first difference in the match. After a good Usapist sequence in the 22, Quentin Walcker is served in the center position. There, we do not really understand what is happening, but the future Castres player mystifies Francis Saili and manages to create a gap by serving Jaminet. The latter fixed and gave for Georges Tilsley, who scored the first try of the match in the corner. After the transformation of Jaminet, it's 7 to 0 for the Catalans.

Despite this fine attempt, we quickly fall back on a false rhythm which rather benefits the Basques, who we feel have come to show what they can do best: be boring. Steffon Armitage and Johnny Dyer come to rot the rucks and scratch a few penalties then we embark on a duel of scorers between Hart and Jaminet. 7-3, 10-3, 10-6, 10-9, 13-9 then 16-9, the scoreboard progresses at the same time as our desire for a nap. Fortunately, a little violence comes to wake us up from time to time. We thank Usap and their one-pass game plan "we target the 10 opposite and we try to kill him by sending Tilsley right on it", which bears fruit fairly quickly since Illian Perraux comes out on concussion protocol shortly before the break.

On the Biarrot side, we are just as creative with a strategy that could be summed up as "we give the ball to Francis Saili and we wait to see what happens". But today, the former Munster player unfortunately lives up to his first name as a pillar of PMU, and not at the level where you would expect a former All Black who rode the Pro D2 all season. In short, we remain at 16-9 at the break.

During half-time, we take a walk on the Canal + set where Sébastien Chabal and Frédéric Michalak wear beautiful suits and blow the wind, which must be the main thing we learn at Lyon Business School whose benches they attend. Marc Lievremont is loyal to Marc Lievremont and dares to say "this match is shit" with the disarming sincerity that sometimes caused him problems during his coaching career.

Back to the field. The kick-off of the second act is given and quickly, it is a little less soft. As we know, the Basques don't give up, as they demonstrated a week ago in Vannes after carrying out the worst attack on Brittany since the invention of sweet butter. The Usapists know very well that a 7-point lead will not be enough for them and they decide to go second. A first offensive brings a new penalty transformed by Jaminet, 19-9. Then the man with the classiest name in the world, Jeronimo de la Fuente, tore the Biarritz defense with a great breakthrough. Deghmache is in support but loses control of the ball 10 yards from goal.

On the scrum that follows, the Blood and Gold pack takes over and recovers the ball. The pounding of the line can begin, and Acebes is very close to going to score in force. The Catalans insist, then comes the moment when Saili confirms to us that he is definitely having a great day with a voluntary interception/forward attempt which kills the action. Logical yellow card. The Hedgehog Eaters decide not to take the penalty and insist on scoring the try. And logically, there too, it ends up passing with Ben Volavola who slaloms in the defense for the second try. 26-9, the Top 14 is starting to smell good for Perpignan, so good that we can already see Eric Bayle writing "I thought I saw a Jaminet" in his joke book for next season.

Be careful all the same, because we have already said it, the Basques will be relous until the end. Moreover, here they are again within 22 meters of Usap for a long offensive sequence, while Saili returns to the field. But Pro D2's best defense holds firm and even manages to scratch a penalty on the ground to give itself some air.

No time to be silly: the Sang et Or want to close the deal and do not take the points after yet another fault by Biarrots. Touch, ball carried, planting of tent in the 22 meters. Then Volavola takes out his special: the pass with the foot which is not essential and which is not even precise. But sometimes it works all the same, for example here thanks to Barnabé Couilloud's hole-making (note the sadism of the parents who are called Couilloud and who decide to add to it by naming their son Barnabé...). Jaminet followed well and scored an old hitch try, which he transformed into a corner. 33-9, it's done.

The losers of the day will plant a try for honor in the 79th^th, but the Biarrots already knew that their place in the Top 14 will be decided in a play-off match. What they did not yet know at that time, however, is that this catch-up final would take place against Bayonne, in a match that will surely look more like a civil war than a sporting meeting. Final score, 34-14, the Uspa is crowned French Pro D2 champion for the second time in its history, and it is well deserved after this season dominated head and shoulders.

A strange off-season then begins in Catalonia, where Usapist players will probably be torn between two feelings: the desire to stick to it for 8 weeks to celebrate a well-deserved title, and the fear of being run over next season. if they take too much murge. In life, everything is about balance. And we know that the Catalans are very balanced people, so personally, I am convinced that they will have a better season in the Top 14 than SU Agen in 2020-2021.

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