French rugby resumes its rights this Saturday with the kick-off of the Top 14. The story will remember that this 2025-2026 vintage begins at 1 p.m. at the Jean-Bouin stadium with a match between Stade Français Paris and Montauban, the promoted surprise this season. And that it will end at the end of June with semi-finals in Marseille and a final at the Stade de France, after an endless season of ten months.
Favorites
And it is Toulouse who leaves again favorite to win a 4th consecutive, even private until the end of November of his star Antoine Dupont, in rehabilitation after his operation on the knee. “There is only one team that can project themselves in 11 months in this championship,” said Patrice Collazo, manager of Racing 92, in a reference to the Toulousains almost some to be in the final phase.
For the others, it is more uncertain in this top 14, “the most demanding championship in the world”, dixit the international winger of Pau Théo Attissogbe. In the pack behind Toulouse, the Union Bordeaux-Bègles, reigning European champion and beaten in the final over the past two years by the men of Ugo Mola, is a main rival. “Having won the European Cup motivates us even more to touch the Brennus shield,” says Bordeaux Nicolas Depoortere.
For qualification, it will be tight again between Toulon, Castres, Bayonne and Clermont, who had managed to reach the top 6 last year, and La Rochelle, Pau, Montpellier or Lyon which were not far away. The Ile -de -France residents of Racing 92 and the Stade Français will want to redeem themselves after a very disappointing season. Montauban, promoted to surprise, may suffer. “We will not be able to run more than what we did in Prod2,” admits Fred Quercy, Captain Montalbanais. But we will try to be faster… ”
New products
There will be 3 main new features this season, said the director general of the National Rugby League, Emmanuel Eschalier, at the start of the week. In terms of arbitration first, the orange box appears. It is the declination of the 20 -minute red card, generalized by World Rugby, in French rugby.
In the event of a serious lack of a player, there are now three possible sanctions: the red card (definitive exclusion), the yellow card (temporary exclusion of 10 minutes) and now, between the two, the orange card (definitive exclusion from the fault but which can be replaced after 20 minutes by another player).
The other two new features concern the development of matches, with a new protocol before kick -off (which made a few teeth cringe from the referees) and a new dressing of matches on the screen by the broadcaster, Canal +, “modernized, more immersive, which highlights the clubs, their singularity”, according to Emmanuel Eschalier.
Finances
Canal + remains the main financier of French pro rugby, with 122.7 million paid to the LNR this season to broadcast Top 14 and Prod2. It is 68 % of the League income, which are then donated to the 30 French Pros clubs. Clubs whose budgets tend to inflate well: the average budget in top 14 has increased from 24 to 34 million euros in ten years (+ 45 %). All well accompanied by an audience success on TV (2 million viewers on average each weekend, including 592,000 for the poster on Sunday evening) and in stadiums (16,000 spectators on average).
To prevent the bubble from exploding in clubs supported by patrons and where wage inflation is watching, the novelty this year is the strengthening of the Salary Cap, set at 10.7 million euros. “We have already voted to strengthen sanctions, which can be sports and no more financial,” recalls Yann Roubert, president of the LNR. The subject will be on the agenda again this fall, to set a new amount at the Salary Cap for the 2027-2028 season. This is an essential condition for a model to work. »»
Clubs like Toulon or Toulouse have recently been pinned. As of now, the ancillary income of the players, which made it possible to bypass the Salary Cap, will be checked and integrated into it. This caused some concerns about the protection of players’ privacy, according to their provale union.
“There was never any question of going to see what the players bought,” says Yann Roubert. We only speak of declaration of their professional income and all that is related to (image law, advertising contracts). We exchanged constructively with Provale during the summer. It is everyone’s interest in having clear, fair and sustainable rules, while respecting their privacy. »»
,autocrop(1200:630) "Sporting vs Benfica: Lisbon Derby Set for Portuguese Handball Cup Final")