By Mark H
October 18 2006

We've got 3 European Challenge Cup previews coming up in the coming days and weeks. Tomorrow we have a tournament preview, and there will soon be a guide to Montauban (similar to those we did for Paris). We start, however, with a look at the only team new to European competition this year - Albi.

Sometimes you just know that you've made a good decision.  It's no secret that I enjoy French rugby; problem was, I had never seen a game live, other than the last three finals, which were more like internationals.

 

The destination was easy to decide.  Back in December 2004, a week after we got engaged, Lom and I decided to head off to Albi for their Pro D2 (the French second division) derby against Montauban.  Except we never got there - a rail strike put us onto a bus to Castres with a connection to Albi, but there was no connection to Albi, ever.  And as it was a Sunday, only one shop in Castres was open, which closed ten minutes after we got there.  Ever since, we've been determined to get there one day, and using the excuse "it might be my only chance whilst they're in the Top 14", off I went.  (And of course, "I can get you a great anniversary present".  That seems to work.)

 

Albi's rise into the Top 14 has been little short of unbelievable.  Even just six years ago, they were at the equivalent of National Three.  Coach Eric Bechu, a big bear of a man with a growing reputation, came in, and after some difficulties in moving up a level (finishing top of the third level four years ago but losing the play-off), it's been a steady climb, culminating in last season.  The second placed finish was a remarkable result in itself for such a small club, but then to beat Beziers and Dax in the playoffs, the second an especially nervy 12-8 win, meant that Albi were at the top level of French rugby for the first time in nineteen years - and it was a 40 club top division then.

 

The town only has 47,000 inhabitants.  Ten thousand of those went to that final, and the promotion meant that a new stand had to be erected quick sharp to make the ground ready for top flight rugby (no RFU restrictions here, it's ability only).  It was ready in only seven weeks, another example of the town pulling together behind the club.  Now all that was needed was results on the pitch.

 

 

As of the day of the game (26th September), Albi had played seven games this season.  the four away trips had brought a total of twelve points, four losses and a single bonus point - defeats had come at Toulouse (23-0), Brive (6-3), Agen (32-3), and Biarritz (20-6).  At home, well...

 

The last home defeat prior to the start of the season had come in that game I missed, against Montauban in December 2004.  Last season brought 15 wins and a draw (Montauban again), but they were now in a different league.  The opening day would surely see an end brought to that record, with Bayonne visiting the Stand Municipal.  Nope, they were despatched 24-12 with relative ease.  Bourgoin, sixth last season, were next up, and went away with only one point in a 21-18 defeat.  The Tarn derby saw Montauban beaten 12-10 - three out of three, but the cynics would say point out that none of them had come against the "big" clubs.  Here, with the visit of Perpignan, would come the sternest test.

 

Albi is a club whose players are still semi-professional.  There are things you wouldn't see in the English Premiership - no ticket booking facility (you have to queue three hours before kick off); the chance to walk around the inside of the ground on the afternoon of the game - but there's also a very warm welcome, even though the Falcons training shirt was looked at with a mixture of suspicion and curiosity.  25 euros bought a top priced ticket - cheapest seats were €15, standing €12, whilst kids got in for €6 and disabled supporters €3 - and aside from the perils of looking over a running track, it was an excellent view.

 

A suitably hyped up announcer built up the atmosphere (not that it needed help), and we were ready.  Until now, I thought that the Perpignan supporters were the loudest I'd heard pre-kick off, but it's all changed now.  Having waited so long to get here, I thought that it would be nice to see a good start.  It was a dream start.  With less than two minutes on the clock, full back Julian Laharrague made a dog's dinner of a high kick from Albi fly-half Andre Hough, and centre Tim Bowker dived to ground the ball for a perfect start of the home side.

 

This was not a game for backs though, much as Perpignan scrum half Nicolas Durand tried to prove otherwise.  This was a night for the forwards, and a visiting pack who usually turn the screw were finding themselves becoming completely unbolted.  The focal point of the pressure was coming from loosehead Boris Stankovich, a cult hero in the Micky Ward mould but even more so, popular multiplied a hundredfold.  As he said after the match, he's not an international, but he's playing against them and doing a job to the best of his abilities.  Having seen the mess he made of Nicolas Mas, he has a lot of ability.  (And before someone says so, he's French, we won't sign him - he's a former England under 21 international who began his career at London Irish).

 

Stankovich came through the D2 days with Albi.  Fly-half Hough was one of the summer signings, and did what was required of him by scoring a penalty and a drop goal before half time, whilst his opposite number Nicolas Laharrague managed to miss three relatively straightforward shots at goal.  A bad half for Mrs L's not so little boys.  It should be said at this point that it wasn't for the want of trying that Perpignan remained at zero until the break, but excellent defence from the black shirted Albigeois prevented not only points but clear cut chances as well.  These were not tackles as we know them, but hits as only a French forward can produce, designed to stop the ball going back.  It was thrilling to watch a game played at a pace far greater than anything the Premiership can offer.

 

13-0 at half time then, and I hoped that all of the home side's efforts in the first forty minutes were not now going to be blown away.  Hough, who ended the first half by putting a 70 metre penalty wide (it had the distance though), made another kick for 16-0, and I have to admit that it was starting to be funny; when supposedly the best scrummaging team in France get a five metre lineout, drive it forward three metres before being pushed back ten, and it happens right in front of you, all you can do is laugh.  Manny Edmonds, a first half replacement and allegedly in dispute with the Catalan club as they won't play him at 10, hit the wrong side of the post with a penalty.  The USAP front row, replaced en masse at the interval, still creaked.

 

 

Still it did not look likely that the visitors would score.  Lively Albi scrum half Sebastien Pages came off after 65 minutes and was encouraging more noise from a crowd not yet noised out.  The closer it got to a nilling, the volume went up to the fabled eleven.

 

And then Les Albigeois received their own spinal tap.  Second row Arnaud Mela was binned by referee Joel Jutge to try and even up the contest (if Perpignan couldn't score past 15, they might do better against 14).  The seven man pack promptly went to the next scrum and pushed the eight off the ball.  The roof, such as it was, came off.  The huffing went on, most of which was from Jutge, who on 69 minutes gave a terrible decision at a scrum where the ball had already been kicked out of proper control; thinking it had been moved illegally, he went to the posts for an undeserved penalty try.  It was the only way they were going to score, but even the TV replay later proved he'd dropped a crock.  The last eleven minutes would now be unnecessarily nervy.

 

 

Or at least they should have been.  Albi just took control again, and tried to keep the ball in the Perpignan half.  Every home decision brought a thunderous roar, every away one that brand of whistling unique in France.  When with just over two minutes left, Albi gained another kickable penalty, Hough merely kicked for the corner, confident in his pack's ability to win the ball and eat up time.  The noise level (I knew I was right to take my dictaphone) went up again; the Perpignan supporters near me had given up on the win and wanted "le drop" to try and get a bonus point; and the home support "adapted" USAP's song into something that I believe mentioned poo (my French isn't that good).  The final bell tolled - literally - as Perpignan tried to run the ball from their own half to get a point.  Their night was summed up by a pass that went both forward and into touch.  Definitely not their night.

 

 

It was Albi's though.  They celebrated, as they have with each win, like they'd won the Boucclier du Brennus.  Stankovich was roared off, as were they all.  Bechu walked off in tears.  Their biggest victory had, given the other results (which included Montauban beating Biarritz) meant the smallest club in the Top 14 were now ninth, nine points clear of the bottom two, and having played both of them.

 

 

The Albi way's not special, there's no great secret.  It's based on winning your home games, as 13 wins would definitely mean a spot in the Top 14 next year (when, incidentally, it reverts to one down due to the World Cup).  I'll be amazed if they win all thirteen, but it's possible - Toulouse visit during the Autumn internationals, Stade Francais immediately before a possible Heineken semi, Biarritz immediately before a probable home quarter final.  Six, possibly seven more wins, should be enough.  They already have four from eight, six or seven from eighteen should be an easier task.

 

They deserve to stay up.  It's a good club, with some players I'd like to see in Falcons shirts (all forwards, unsurprisingly), and with great self belief.  the queue at the bar was familiar post match, but no-one cared.  This was a night for joy, and dreaming of bigger things.  In my case, it was a dream come true.

 

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Since that game and when I wrote this article, Albi have played three more matches, going to Paris and losing 25-12 to Stade Francais, and beating Montpellier 15-9 at home, to extend the home record to 29 matches without defeat.  And then finally, on Saturday, came the much treasured away win, in their Tarn derby at Castres 19-16, thanks to an incredibly late penalty try.  The dream is still running, and they have European competition, for the first time in their history, to come.