Pro D2: “Behind, too, we want to score tries”, announces, enthusiastically, Pierre Courtaud, the ASBH winger, after his team's success over Provence Rugby

Pierre Courtaud, lors du deuxième match face à Biarritz au stade Raoul-Barrière. Midi Libre – JEAN-MICHEL MART

L’ailier Pierre Courtaud revient sur l’encourageante victoire de son équipe face à Provence Rugby (39-20) lors d'un match, où les avants ont été déterminants.

What was said in the locker room at half-time, when your team was down by one point (19-20) ?

We told ourselves to be more disciplined, to be better organized on our defensive line. In Valencia, we were able to take the points, to be calmer. That's what we also tried to do against Provence in the second half. We also often took the lineout because we felt we were performing well on our mauls. The forwards really did a great job. So all that was left to do was to continue!

We feel that the automatisms are coming back, right ?

We spent two complicated first matches looking for ourselves, struggling to produce our game. We are starting to find ourselves. We don't have our reference match yet. It is clear that we can do better. But we are getting closer. This can be seen in the score against a team that is aiming for the top 6, like us.

You found yourself twice in numerical inferiority and you held on. Wasn't that one of the turning points of the match??

We managed to control the balls well at the back. They occupied a lot and that worked out for us because we also occupied and scored on their mistakes. As soon as we were fifteen, we produced a better game than theirs and were above.

The three-quarters perform behind increasingly competitive forwards…

Our forwards are doing a better job week after week. Against Provence Rugby, they were at their best. Behind, we only scored one try, at the end. Behind too, of course, we want to score, to produce play. Obviously, it irritates us to see the forwards scoring all these tries! But in the end, the most important thing is the victory and the five points.

Isn't that a reassuring success for the future, Béziers establishing itself as one of the big teams in the championship ?

We have two away wins in this block. There is still one match to play outside Béziers. The goal is to go and get it to make up for the match lost against Biarritz. We proved against Provence Rugby that we are capable of it.

With always this determination at the end of the match…

We perform well in the last minutes. This was seen against BO, where we almost scored on a last action. In Valencia, we also went for the victory at the end. We showed it again against Aix with the help of the public who helped us a lot.