Toulouse keep their‘ double’ dream alive with La Rochelle rematch | James Harrington

Friday's 2020/21 season Top 14 final will be a repeat of last month's blood-and-thunder Champions Cup showpiece, after both La Rochelle and Toulouse won their respective semi-finals in Lille.

La Rochelle's president Vincent Merling was overcome with emotion after his side reached their first-ever Top 14 final, a month after their first Champions Cup final, with a comprehensive 19-6 win over Racing 92 on Friday night.

It was – in all-but scoreline – an annihilation. French rugby has a habit of overturning expectations. The bulk of the talent and experience wore Racing colours, but all the team spirit was in the black and gold of La Rochelle.

And it showed. They kept their opponents' vaunted backline at bay all night – despite the presence of Virimi Vakatawa, Gael Fickou, Kurtley Beale, Finn Russell and with Simon Zebo coming off the bench, Racing could not score a point after the 14th minute of the game. They were dominant up front, and about as close to perfect in defence as it's possible to be. It was an object lesson in knockout rugby.

If La Rochelle-Racing was all about control, Toulouse-Bordeaux started as a full-throated roar of a match at Pierre Mauroy, where the roof was closed last night as thunderstorms hammered Lille.

The two sides traded early tries, courtesy of Romain Ntamack and Ben Lam, and although the 2019 champions were 14-7 ahead at half-time, it was far from clear who was in control – unlike the previous night.

But Toulouse, who were three for three against Bordeaux when the match kicked off, including that surgical Champions Cup semi-final victory at Ernest Wallon at the beginning of last month, and a regular seasonending hatchet job at Chaban Delmas, made it a full house – despite a second try for Lam – as the match degenerated into a frantic arm-wrestle.

It was the red card for Ulupano Seuteni for a dangerous tackle that knocked out Ntamack, that handed the crucial advantage back to Toulouse.And Thomas Ramos made the most of the advantage after a long period of pressure. Even then, the result wasn't certain. Jalibert pulled the score back to 24-21 with three minutes to play – but Toulouse held on.

The results mean that Fabien Galthie – who was due to name his 42-player squad for the three-Tests-in-11-days tour of Australia today will not select any players from either La Rochelle or Toulouse. He reportedly had 80-odd players on speed dial in the run-up to the semi-finals, pending his final selection.

The national coach has also lost the services of Gael Fickou and Teddy Baubigny, both injured in Racing's loss to La Rochelle, Baptiste Serin – who has had shoulder surgery, and captain Charles Ollivon, out for several months with an ACL tear. Camille Chat has broken his leg, and Virimi Vakatawa is also a doubt, having nursed a knee injury through the semi-final.

A number of French top-flight clubs, meanwhile, have formally confirmed their new signings, closing their cheque books and locking them away in the bottom drawer in the process – for now, at least.

Normally this process passes off with minimal fuss. Castres announced 12 new arrivals – including back row Teariki Ben-Nicholas from Super Rugby's Highlanders, French 2019 U20s world championship-winning centre Antoine Zeghdar, and Fijian winger Josaia Raisuqe – in a statement that was almost unanimously greeted with quiet enthusiasm.

But then there's Toulon –a club that seems incapable of doing anything at the moment without incident. So it was at the club's traditional end-ofseason press conference, after a campaign in which they failed to reach the play-offs, had their European dreams ended by Covid-19, and missed out on a Champions Cup place.

“Toulon seem incapable of doing anything at the moment without incident”

The club announced ten new arrivals, a one-year contract extension for Sergio Parisse, and promised two more signings among the backs – and then club president Bernard Lemaitre suggested former player Julian Savea had talked a god-tier New Zealand star out of joining the club, in preference for another Top 14 side.

He mentioned no names – but it took no detective skills to come up with the name Ngani Laumape, who was confirmed as joining Stade Francais several weeks ago.

What followed was a cross-hemisphere Twitter spat that was far from an advert for rugby's self-proclaimed ‘respect' epithet.

Savea – whose short time on the south coast of France was not an entirely enjoyable experience – insisted he did not have to say anything about the club, because it was wellknown in rugby circles. Some of the replies from Toulon ‘fans' were, frankly, abusive and unacceptable.

And Laumape chimed in, to say ‘The Bus' had told him nothing bad about life and sport on the Mediterranean coast.

It was the latest in a series of statements from Lemaitre that could almost make fans wish for a return to the calmer Boudjellal days. Certainly, more than a few are questioning the club's new-look local youth first policy.

Coach Patrice Collazo doubled down on the new route, saying that internationals were not always worth the price. He told reporters: “We had built the squad around the internationals.

“But we realised that we cannot measure their number at the start of the season. In future, we will think differently. We will rely on a base of players who will be exclusively dedicated to the club.

“We no longer want to rely on internationals, they should only be added value.”

He highlighted the Six Nations period of the season as the time Toulon lost the Top 14 plot.

“We really suffered during the February-March period, ” he said, “because of a lack of staffing depth. “I felt the team collapsed at that time. When the internationals came back, we asked a lot of them, and as they are on a double project, they were not necessarily, at times, playing at their best.”

Truth be told, the entire second half of Toulon's season was a disappointment. They picked up just 29 points between January and June.

Lemaitre, in a lucid moment, indicated that he's ready to back Collazo for the long haul. But next season will be crucial to the coach's future.