Rugby: Zach Mercer best player of the season in Top 14, Antoine Dupont best player of the France team

The champion of France is at the party. And that’s not really a surprise. After lifting the Shield of Brennus last season, Montpellier was logically put forward during the Night of Rugby. Thus, the English third line of the MHR, Zach Mercer, who will join Gloucester in June 2023, was voted best player in the Top 14 on Monday last season, at the end of which he was one of the main architects of the first Brennus Shield of the Hérault club. “It’s been a great year for me and I never imagined that a year ago. I’m very lucky and I have to thank all the staff at Montpellier that it was very difficult to leave,” said the Englishman after receiving his award.

Two years after his arrival in Hérault, the English international (2 caps) announced at the end of August that he was signing up with the “Cherry and White” (Premiership) in the hope of participating in the next Coupe du world in France (September 8 – October 28, 2023). Mercer, who must evolve in an English club if he wants to be eligible for the XV de la Rose, succeeds the scrum half of Toulouse and the Blues Antoine Dupont, voted best player last year, and who retains his title of “best French international” this season. This prize “takes us back to the incredible season with the XV of France: the match against the Blacks (40-25, last fall), the Grand Slam, finishing at home against England… These are moments that we will remember for life and it’s nice to think back on it, “said at the end of the ceremony, the best player in the world in 2021.

Another Toulousaine, and another N.9, wins the Blue bet: Laura Sansus, voted best player of the 2022 Six Nations Tournament, succeeds Marjorie Mayans. Both are in the group of 32 French players who will compete in the Women’s World Cup in New Zealand from October 8.