Top 14: Bordeaux fly without TMO, Dupont shines, O'Gara goes West

Sixth-place Bordeaux played without TV match official services for technical reasons

CALL THE CELEBRATION POLICE? Bordeaux-Begles' players celebrate after winning the French Top 14 rugby union match with Aviron Bayonnais (Bayonne) at the Jean Dauger Stadium in Bayonne. (Photo by Gaizka IROZ / AFP via Getty Images)

Ronan O’Gara has named Stade Francais-bound Ihaia West at starting full-back for La Rochelle’s Sunday night must-win Top 14 match against play-off chasing Racing 92 at La Defense Arena.

West made a crucial turnover in a five-minute cameo at the back as the Rochelais won at Perpignan to keep their own top-six hopes alive last time out, and has been rewarded with the 15 shirt in Nanterre, where the turnover-heavy terrain has O’Gara believing two playmakers — Antoine Hastoy starts at 10, alongside scrum-half Nolann Le Garrec — are better than one.

To make room for West, Davit Niniashvili drifts out to the wing, while Ulupano Seuteni returns to the starting line-up, joining Semi Lagivala in midfield.

Elsewhere, the injury curse that has plagued La Rochelle this season still hasn’t lifted. Backrow Paul Boudehent and hooker Pierre Bourgarit both picked up training ground knocks that has ruled them out for this weekend’s match. Matthias Haddad-Victor and Tolu Latu cover their respective roles, while replacement hooker Quentin Lespiaucq is set to make his 100th appearance for the club.

Both sides need a victory to maintain their play-off ambitions, after all of the top six picked up important end-of-season victories.

Driven by replacement fly-half Matthieu Jalibert, sixth-place Bordeaux – in a match without TV match official services for technical reasons, requiring the game’s fourth and fifth officials to monitor the in-goal areas — roared back from 38-19 down on the hour to win 40-38 and condemn Bayonne to another home defeat. The Basque side still have not won at Stade Jean Dauger in 2026.

That win meant the Champions Cup finalists, in the sixth and final play-off spot, opened up a four-point lead over Racing 92 in the table, and are 10 points clear of La Rochelle.

Fifth-place Clermont, meanwhile, swept promotion-relegation play-off outfit Perpignan aside, picking up a try-scoring bonus as they won 45-15 at Stade Marcel Michelin.

A bonus-point 59-17 win over Lyon didn’t impress fourth-placed Stade Francais’ scrum-half Louis Carbonel much. “If we had faced a top team today, I think we would have struggled,” he told journalists after the victory at Stade Jean Bouin.

Justo Riccardo scored four of Montpellier’s nine tries — Adam Beard also got his first for Ulster’s Challenge Cup final opponents — as they officially condemned Montauban to the drop after just one season in the Top 14 with a 59-7 bonus-point win that saw them climb to second in the table.

Pau dropped to third after finding it more difficult than they thought to put away an ever-indisciplined Castres at Stade du Hameau. Two late penalties, while the visitors’ English international tighthead Will Collier was sin-binned, helped the home side to a 27-15 win.

The Top 14’s crowd average — up more than two percent year-on-year so far according to the LNR — got a boost as Toulon hosted Toulouse in front of nearly 67,000 fans at a sold-out Orange Velodrome in Marseille on Saturday night.

Antoine Dupont, who has faced serious questions over his form and fitness since his return from a second ACL injury, was in impressive form as the visitors bagged a fourth bonus-point victory on the road, winning 51-27.