On February 4, while their plane remained grounded in Toulon due to fog, the Bordeaux-Bègles players obviously had a bit of a bad time. “Since we had already played on Sunday, that made us lose a day of vacation,” says their manager, Yannick Bru. However, they had been waiting for this week of rest for a long time; since the end of October exactly, the World Cup (September 8-October 28) having disrupted the calendar, forcing Top 14 players to play fifteen matches in a row (eleven in the Top 14, four in the Champions Cup or Challenge) between October 29 and February 4. Never seen. “Such a block had never been done,” explains one of Montpellier’s physical trainers, Benjamin Del Moral. “And again,” adds Bru, “if we add the two friendly matches in October, we are on a series of 17 matches. »
