From a few weeks ago:
Toulon v Grenoble Round 16
This was a cracking game which was supposed to be a walkover but wasn't.
Toulon is now a rugby powerhouse under its eccentric owner Mourad Boudjellal, and was in the Top 14 final last year.
In this home game they started ex-Super players Bakkies Botha, Juan Smith, David Smith and Drew Mitchell. On the bench arguably the best player in the Top 14 at the minute, Matt Giteau, was given a rest against a team that finished in eleventh place last year, as were other Super men Carl Hayman, Rudi Wulf and Michael Claassens.
Grenoble is the hardy mountain team that plays above it's weight and would have to be one of the best-coached sides in the competition.
It had ex-Super players also, but not quite in the same class collectively: Ben Hand and Peter Kimlin starting, and Dayna Edwards and Henry Vanderglass on the bench.
There was another Ausse ex-Super player involved also: Richard Kingi, who was in the commentary box with Robbie Nock—or more exactly: in the Eurosport studio in Paris.
Grenoble played out of their skins and pushed the envelope on defence. They were three points ahead at oranges, but Toulon played better in the second half and with 17 minutes to go the home team was ahead 21-15. Not a try had been scored.
Then with a couple of minutes left Toulon are on attack and wanting to get another score to deny the pesky mountain men a bonus point loss. A Toulon advantage has just expired when Johnny Wilkinson throws a long pass right on the money to …… Grenoble winger Ratu Ratini who intercepts it and scores under the posts,
The conversion gives the win to Grenoble 22-21.
Toulon owner Boudjellal, who was banned two years ago for four months, when he said that referees were sodomising his team, gave his side a bit of a shaft himself.
He said they were "Kings of the idiots".
Nice cheque book, but not a nice guy.
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