Mickaël Guillard’s nomination as man of the match for his performance in France’s 36-14 thrashing of Ireland was richly deserved. If one watched a ten minutes’ highlights package of the Bleus’ barnstorming win, the standout display was from Louis Bielle-Biarrey, whose brace of tries took his tally to 22 in 23 Tests.
Bielle-Biarrey is some player: “The supersonic winger beating all records,” was how one French newspaper described him on Friday. But it would have been a rank injustice if he had pipped Guillard to the man of the match award. The second row was immense against Ireland. Sixteen carries, 43 metres made, two passes, one offload, one linebreak, seven tackles and two turnovers. And all in the first fifty minutes.
Guillard was hooked ten minutes into the second half. And why not? The Irish were dead and buried at half-time and France coach Fabien Galthie wanted to keep his giant second row as fresh as possible for the rest of the tournament. Guillard was asked after the match if he had any more gas in the tank when he was substituted. “Honestly, no!’ he said, laughing. “I was exhausted, even though I could have kept going if I had to.”
Guillard and Bielle-Biarrey embody the cliché about rugby being a game for all shapes and sizes. The Bordeaux wing is 6ft and 13st 3lbs; the Lyon lock stands 6ft 5in and weighs 19st. Both have become essential to France in the last couple of seasons.
Guillard won the first of his fourteen caps on the summer tour to Argentina in 2024. It was twelve months later, in New Zealand, that the 25-year-old came of age as an international despite the tourists losing all three Tests. The New Zealand Herald described Guillard after the third Test as ‘the best back-row on the pitch’.
He played No8 in New Zealand but against Ireland he was in the second-row, the position he occupies most of the time for Lyon in the Top 14. His club coach, Fabien Gengenbacher, has described Guillard as ‘a true Swiss Army knife…from 4 to 8, we know we can count on him.” Galthie prefers to call Guillard one of his ‘hybrid’ players.
Not that Guillard minds where he plays, remarking that “there isn’t much difference between the number 5 and number 8 positions in the game plan. I really enjoy carrying the ball, so I made myself available as much as possible”. The enjoyment isn’t felt by his opponents who have to tackle his tree-trunk legs.
Guillard began playing rugby aged five with the Maurepas-Elancourt rugby academy, south-west of Paris. The head of the academy, Gilles Renand, remembered a “boy who didn’t know how to run… he had a strange way of running, as if he lacked coordination”. His handling skills were clumsy but what made an impression on Renand was the physical strength of Guillard.
In a recent interview with Midi Olympique, Guillard said his parents enrolled him in the academy because he was a ‘turbulent’ child. They hoped rugby would help him channel his energy.
He cites his mum as the biggest influence on his career, supporting her son ‘morally and financially’, making sacrifices so that he could pursue his dream of playing for France. Not long after he’d been bitten by the rugby bug, Guillard and his mum were glued to the screen watching France play.
Guillard’s mum, who is originally from Madagascar, considers her son a miracle. When she was 23 she was told she would never be able to have children. She tried various treatments but with always the same heartbreaking result. Then in 2000 she fell pregnant and Mickaël was born a fortnight before Christmas that year.
Guillard joined the Massy club when he was fifteen. The club, in the southern suburbs of Paris, is the finishing school for most teenage Parisians with promise. In recent years Mathieu Bastareaud, Judicaël Cancoriet, Jordan Joseph, Yacouba Camara, Sekou Macalou, Cameron Woki and Léo Barré have all graduated from Massy.
Guillard’s coach at Massy was Joffrey Delacour, who remembers a youth who was developing well, physically and technically. “He had a lot of running power and had good hands, he could catch the ball and offload.”
The natural transition would have been to sign professional terms with one of the two Parisian clubs in the Top 14, Racing 92 or Stade Francais. But Lyon, coached at the time by Pierre Mignoni, were the first to spot Guillard’s potential. Philippe Agostini, the head of Lyon’s training centre, came to Paris in 2020 and Guillard liked what he told him. “It was the best sporting project for me, I really felt appreciated,” he said subsequently.
Guillard made his senior debut for Lyon in September 2020, aged 19, and within two years had established himself as a regular. Mignoni has left Lyon for Toulon but thanks to his foresight he bequeathed the club a formidable player in Guillard. It is not just the big man’s physical skills that impresses his coaches and teammates, it is also his personal traits.
Agostini believes that Guillard will one day captain France because of his work-rate, his humility and the inspiring effect he has on his teammates. The effect Guillard has on opponents is intimidation, whatever the position he plays.
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An awesome player - what a pleasure to watch.
Good read, I wonder if the writer saw that back row performance from “much of a muchness” players (as he described them in a previous article) Cros, Jégou, Jelonch and then Nouchi off the bench.
Guillard came of age in the 6N last year, not in New Zealand. After Meafou got a lung infection he grabbed the 5 jersey and took it with both hands. How he didn’t win the 6N breakthrough player of the tournament was baffling, instead Sam Prendergast won it. Reminds me a bit of Cros not being in the 6N team of the tournament or not a single Argentinian being in the World XV. I won’t comment about why I think that is.
I can see Guillard becoming captain one day too, once Dupont has finished his international career or perhaps even when he’s unavailable. For now though, he just has to concentrate on his performances and keep going in this fashion.