Top 14 2020/21 club-by-club season preview: Bayonne
After a strong start, a first season back in the Top 14 for Bayonne was derailed by mumps before Covid-19 stopped everything. It will be just as tough in the top flight in their second season…
Key signing
Gaetan Germain: An injury-troubled couple of seasons have seen Germain’s legendarily unmissable howitzer boot track a little left in recent times. On his day, though, he can still ping them over from a long way out. A useful addition to Yannick Bru’s squad.
Key departure
Tongan lock/back row Edwin Maka should have a few years in him yet but after a season on the Basque coast, his future is currently uncertain. He was one of 19 departures from Bayonne this summer – and he wasn’t the only one with nowhere to go.
New season will be coming ???#new #season #rugby #bayonne #aviron #aupa #baiona #work #focus pic.twitter.com/7grbuPXBgm
— John Ulugia (@LugieJ) August 26, 2020
They say
“We would like to finish mid-table in the Top 14. We were a bit of a surprise last year. Now, we are a known quantity… we have to be ambitious but not pretentious.”
Club president Philippe Taybe – France Bleu
We say
It was an outbreak of a different sort that stalled Bayonne’s campaign last season after a strong start in which they beat Racing 92 at La Defense Arena on opening day and won five of their opening seven games.
Between mid-October and mid-January, however, they only won one game in all competitions as the squad was hit hard by mumps. Despite the ill-health strain on the squad, they did enough to finish ninth in their first season back in the Top 14 after two years in the Pro D2.
How not to build a squad
What is even more remarkable is that Bayonne – Pro D2 champions in 2018/19 courtesy of a nerveless penalty from Martin Bustos Moyano with what turned out to be his last touch of a ball for the club – built a team for the Top 14 in about three weeks out of what was left in the transfer market.
It was no way to prepare for a return to the French top flight and it was to Bayonne and head coach Yannick Bru’s credit that they made such a pretty decent fist of it.
Calm recruitment
This time around, recruitment was done and dusted calmly and quietly before coronavirus cut short the 2019/20 season. Only Izaia Perese, who ended a two-year flirtation with rugby league in Australia to sign for the Basque side, was not formally announced before the end of May.
Rebuilding the scrum, following the retirements of Census Johnston and Aretz Iguiniz, has been the priority. Ulugia, Nixon, Huge Pyle, Alexandre Manukula and Asier Usarraga make up the bulk of the recruitment numbers.
Expect to see Perese get plenty of action in midfield, and watch for excitement from the wing in the form of All Blacks sevens star Joe Ravouvou. Despite the promise, however, don’t be too surprised to see Bayonne – now very much of a known quantity in the Top 14 once again – battling for survival at season’s end.
Arrivals
Sam Nixon, John Ulugia, Hugh Pyle, Gaetan Germain, Joe Ravouvou, Alexandre Manukula (loan), Asier Usarraga, Izaia Perese
Departures
Census Johnston, Aretz Iguiniz, Pieter Jan van Lill, Adam Jaulhac, Edwin Maka, Antoine Battut, Benjamin Collet, Armandt Koster, Emmanuel Saubusse, Julien Tisseron, Setariki Tuicuvu
Hitch for their Top 14 prep https://t.co/b8UpVZSUv0
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) August 28, 2020
Comments on RugbyPass
We’re building a bridge but can't agree where the river is.
2 Go to commentsfirst no arms shoulder or helmet tackle into his rib cage is going to be so very painful even to watch. go back to RU mate.
1 Go to commentsBulls by 5. Plus another 50.
3 Go to commentsJohan Goosen avatar. Cute. Surely someone at RP knows how to do a google image search?
3 Go to commentsCan’t these games play a little earlier? Asking for a friend.
3 Go to commentsIt’s impressive that we can see huge stadiums with attendance in the 40 000 to 50 000 region. It shows how popular this competition is becoming. What is even more impressive is the massive growth in broadcast viewership. The URC is one of the two best leagues in the World, the other being the Top14.
7 Go to commentsChristie is not Sottish, like the majority of the Scotland team.
2 Go to commentsHold the phone, decline over-rated. Is it a one game, dead cat bounce or the real thing? Has the Penney dropped? Stay tuned.
45 Go to commentsTotally deserved win for the Crusaders Far smarter than the Chiefs who seem to be avoiding the basics when it matters Hotham showed them what was missing and Hannah seems a real find - a tad light but that can be fixed over time
8 Go to commentsGreat insight into the performance culture with Sarries and I predict Christie will be a fixture in the Scotland team now for some time to come. However, he is slightly missing his own point around Scotland “being soft” when he cites physicality examples in defence of that slight. The issue is much closer to the example he referenced around feeling off before a game but being told “it doesn’t matter, you can still play well” by Farrell. Until Scotland can get their psyche in that square, they will carry on folding under extreme pressure…
2 Go to comments> We are having to adapt, evolve and innovate more than when we were in Super Rugby where there was only really one style that everybody had to play to gain the most success. Have = able to? Interesting what that one style might be? I thought SA sides still had bad tours now, or at least bad schedule, months away? Those extra few hours flights have to be a killer though, no surprise to see their sides doing so badly at the start of the season each year. I wouldn’t enjoy that unfairness as a supporter.
7 Go to commentsThe problem for NZ, and Aus, is they ripped up the SR model and lost a massive chunk of revenue that hasn’t been replaced. Don’t forget SA clubs went North because they were left with no choice, Argy unceremoniously binned and Japan cast adrift. Now SR wasn’t perfect, far from it, but they’ve jumped into something without an effective plan, so far, to replace what they’ve lost. The biggest revenue potential now lies in Japan but it won’t be easy or quick to unlock, they are incredibly insular in culture as a nation. In the meantime, there is a serious time bomb sitting under SH rugby and if it happens then the current financial challenges will look like a picnic. IF the Boks follow their provincial teams and head north then it’s revenue meltdown. Not guaranteed to happen but the status quo is a very odd hybrid, with the Boks pointing one way and the clubs pointing the other way. And for as long as that remains then the threat is real.
45 Go to commentsI think Etene has had some good tuition, likely while at the Warriors to be a professional that helped his rugby jump, but he was certainly thrown in the deep end way too early. Should have arguably 20 less SR caps, and therefor a way better record that he does at his age, but his development would have been fast tracked by the need to satiate his signing away from league. Again, credit to him and others that he has done it so well. Easy to fall over under that pressure in the big leagues like that but he kept at it when I myself wasn’t sure he was good enough.
1 Go to commentsAwesome story. I wonder what a bigger American (SA) scene might have mean for Brex.
1 Go to comments“Johnny McNicholl and the Crusaders” save a Penney. Who has been in camp this week and showed them how to play?
8 Go to commentsSo, reports of the Crusaders’ demise / terminal decline are perhaps just - slightly - premature/exaggerated…? 🤔 Will we see a deep-dive into that by the estimable Rugbypass scribes, and maybe one or two mea culpas? Thought not.
8 Go to comments1. The Chiefs are rudderless without DMac, which enhances his AB chances 2. Chiefs pack are powderpuffs. The hard men arent there anymore 3. They had their golden title chance last yr and wont threaten this yr. Gone in second round of playoffs.
8 Go to commentsHonestly, why did you have to publish such a foolish article the day they play us? 😂
45 Go to comments> They are not standalone entities. They are linked to an amateur association which holds the FFR licence that allows the professional side to compete in the league. That’s a great rule. This looks like the chicken or egg professional scenario. How long is it going to be before the club can break even (if that is even a thing in French rugby)? If the locals aren’t into well it would be good to se them drop to amateur level (is it that far?). Hope they can reset from this level and be more practical, there will be a time when they can rebuild (if France has there setup right).
1 Go to commentsWhat about changing the ball? To something heavier and more pointed that bounces unpredictably. Not this almost round football used these days.
35 Go to comments