Clermont-Stade Français: Yellow is omnipresent, Halaifonua sees red... the tops and the flops

TOPS

What a performance from the Clermont scrum half! In all the good moves, Baptiste Jauneau created countless gaps for his partners throughout the match and enhanced his score with a magnificent try at speed, scored in the 21st minute of play. In a season tarnished by several injuries, the one who embodies the future of ASM made the Stade Français defense dizzy and showed the full extent of his talent. A return to form which comes at just the right time for the Jaunards in their quest to maintain their position.

He is inevitably one of the great architects of Clermont’s success. Author of a hat-trick (27th, 42nd, 68th), Alivereti Raka completed three actions of his team in the corner showing all his poisonous qualities in the last meters for the opposing defenses. Faulty on the first Parisian try from captain Jeremy Ward (10th), the Clermont winger recovered in a very good way and took full advantage of the spaces generated by the numerical superiority of his partners. With 10 defenders beaten and 56 meters covered with the ball in hand, he was the most prominent Clermont three-quarter on the pitch at the Marcel-Michelin stadium.

A breath of fresh air for ASM. Condemned not to lose, Christophe Urios' men, twelfth before this meeting, offered themselves a more than welcome improved success in the race to maintain. A rare occurrence this season where the Jaunards had only won once with more than three tries in advance. Dominators in all sectors of the game after the red card from Tanginoa Halaifonua (25th), the Clermontois planted a whopping six tries scored by Bautista Delguy (5th), author of an assassin's 80-meter counter, Baptiste Jauneau (21st) , the hat-trick from Alivereti Raka (27th, 42nd, 68th) and finally that of Anthony Belleau (73rd), served on a platter by his full-back Alex Newsome, author of a breakthrough at the heart of the Parisian defense. With 47 points, Clermont is now 10th in the standings and eight points ahead of Montpellier, 13th and provisional play-off. Always present in the elite of French rugby since its creation, ASM is well on its way to continuing its beautiful history at least one more season.

FLOPS

It was an excess of commitment that undoubtedly turned this match around. In the 25th minute of play, Tanginoa Halaifonua received a dismissal from Anthony Belleau, after a successful penalty by his scorer Zach Henry. After a clumsy forward move, the Parisian third row picks up the ball on the ground and charges Clermont winger Bautista Delguy with his elbow forward, at the level of his throat. After video arbitration, the images are final for Mr. Charabas who has no other choice but to exclude him permanently. In the action that followed, Alivereti Raka gave himself his first try of the evening by finishing off a number in the corner (27th). After Anthony Belleau's transformation, ASM Clermont took an eight-point lead (21-13) and was never again worried by the capital's players, overwhelmed in the second half.

Not helped by the early numerical inferiority of his partners, the Parisian opener missed his match. First in the game, where his connection with scrum half Brad Weber was ghostly and his footwork was approximate, but also in his role as a scorer where his two failures in the first act weighed heavily in the balance . Stade Français having the opportunity to return to the locker room with only two points behind. Replaced by Joris Segonds in the 54th minute, Zach Henry undoubtedly lost big before entering the final sprint of the Top 14.

The black series continues for the pink soldiers. While it has never managed to win in Auvergne in the championship in its entire history, the capital club fell again at the Marcel Michelin stadium (41-18), crushed by Clermontois galvanized by their public. The men of the Labit-Ghezal duo may have regrets, as they were on par with their hosts until Tanginoa Halaifonua's red card (25th). Before gradually losing ground in the thread of their meeting. With a comfortable cushion of nine points ahead of Union Bordeaux-Bègles, 3rd, the leader of the Top 14 is almost guaranteed to be directly qualified for the semi-final. Where he will most likely seek not to repeat the same gross error from his third row, which would seriously tarnish an end to the season full of promise for the capital's players.