Toulouse pull off 'a little robbery' as Ntamack stuns Ronan O'Gara and La Rochelle
UNBELIEVABLE: Toulouse head coach Ugo Mola celebrates after Romain Ntamack scored the winning try in the Top 14 decider at a packed Stade de France
Small margins decide matches. Fatigue, discipline and Romain Ntamack told as Toulouse came from behind to be crowned Top 14 champions despite being - just - second-best on the night to Ronan O’Gara’s Champions Cup-winning La Rochelle.
There had been little to separate the two sides before Ntamack sliced through a shattered, out-of-shape defence on halfway in the 78th minute and raced to the line to take Toulouse into a 29-26 lead, with no time left for La Rochelle to muster their remaining dregs of energy for a riposte.
Minutes earlier, with Toulouse 22-26 down, he had fired a penalty kick to touch too long. He was certain, then, he had booted the title beyond Toulouse’s reach. We all were - except, crucially, his team-mates.
Ntamack said afterwards: “If I didn't have this team next to me, these guys who made me lift my head after my mistake when I missed that penalty, I don’t think I could have gone between the posts … They believed more than I did.”
He had that sort of night. His moment of timely brilliance decided the game and won him the player-of-the-match award from a phenomenal Jack Willis - but, in truth, he’d been average.
Both sides had one hand on the Bouclier de Brennus at various moments at Stade de France - Toulouse raced into an early 13-3 lead; La Rochelle, clawed the game back, taking charge with forward-driven power early in the second half; the nerveless Thomas Ramos, who slotted 19 points, pulled the advantage back for Toulouse; then it was La Rochelle’s once more as Antoine Hastoy recovered from two early misses to kick 16 points of his own.
A disappointed O’Gara paid tribute to Ntamack. “A match lasts 80 minutes,” he said. “I learned when I was a player it’s never over against Toulouse. Unfortunately, tonight, we made some bad decisions at the end.
“Well done to Romain Ntamack for scoring that try. What an athlete, what a player - it was an exceptional try. Score a try like that, and you deserve to win. We weren't anywhere near our best tonight. Penalties cost us the match.”
It was undeniably cruel, though. La Rochelle just about deserved to be ahead with the clock ticking down. “We had opportunities to kill the game and we didn't do it,” fullback Brice Dulin said. “It’s a final and we ended up with nothing. It’s the first time I’ve lost a final by controlling the match. That’s the hardest thing to swallow.”
That ending accounts for O’Gara’s post-match frustration. “There was not much difference between the two teams,” he said. “Maybe it’s okay to say the better team lost.
“I've got a great group, but we're very frustrated … We played an average Toulouse team, who took advantage of our mistakes,” he added. “I don't agree that it was a great Toulouse side. I could accept defeat if they'd scored four good tries, but that’s not what we saw.”
Until Ntamack, it looked increasingly likely that La Rochelle’s direct approach would tell - as it had in Dublin last month. Ugo Mola admitted his Toulouse had “pulled off a little robbery”.
“We had some good karma,” he smiled.
Joking apart, La Rochelle’s pack had long been in charge. Scrum power pulled them back into the game late in the first half after Toulouse threatened to ease away in the first quarter.
And their forwards took them into the lead early in a brutal second period, before Hastoy and Ramos traded penalties and the lead.
Suffocating defence defined the first half. But this was no dull, cagey, midfield arm wrestle driven by a fear of defeat.
On a hot, humid June evening in Saint-Denis, Toulouse and La Rochelle went hell-for-leather from the first whistle. Neither side was going to die wondering on the Top 14’s showpiece night at the end of a draining season.
While La Rochelle were on top in the tight, Toulouse were more dangerous in the loose. But, the difference between the two sides was paper-thin - and there was nothing to separate their ferocious defences.
With the defence this tight, mistakes mattered. Santiago Chocobares seized on Jonathan Danty’s fumble, side-stepped the La Rochelle defence to score the game’s opening try in the 23rd minute. O’Gara later described the passage of play as ‘zero threat’ - “it’s just a dropped ball, and it’s a try - that’s the level, it’s merciless”. Ramos converted, and Toulouse were suddenly 13-3 ahead.
But, on the stroke of halftime, Francois Cros knocked on five metres from his own line. From the scrum that followed, Tawera Kerr-Barlow burrowed through Dorian Aldegheri and Emmanuel Meafou to wipe out the arrears. At 13-13, the first-half apero was over. We had a 40-minute final on our hands.
When Uini Atonio crashed over five minutes into the second half, following Pierre Bourgarit’s burst through the middle, the pendulum swung again. La Rochelle had the game by the throat. Their forwards were in control. The win, a first Top 14 title and a historic double, was theirs for the taking if they held their nerve.
Ramos kicked two penalties to take Toulouse ahead briefly - but Hastoy replied with two of his own to give La Rochelle what looked to be an unbeatable advantage - they’ve defended smaller leads at the end of energy-sapping, high-stakes matches before.
Then, Ntamack happened.
Ramos; Retière (Mallia 54), Chocobares, Ahki, Lebel; Ntamack, Dupont; Cros, Roumat (Placines 60), Willis (Tolofua 67); Meafou (Arnold 58), Arnold (Flament 54); Aldegheri (Faumuina 58), Marchand (Mauvaka 60), Baille (Neti 67).
: Barassi.
Dulin; Leyds, Seuteni, Danty, Rhule; Hastoy, Kerr-Barlow (Berjon 69); Botia (Bourdeau 67’) , Alldritt, Paul Boudehent (Dillane 67); Skelton, Sazy (Lavault 51); Atonio (Colombe 60), Bourgarit (Lespiaucq 57), Wardi (Sclavi 60).
: Favre
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