ProD2, r8: Agen reclaim lead with home win over Pau; Lyon's late rally stuns La Rochelle

26 October 2009

SU Agen returned to winning ways, and the top of the table, thanks to their 20-14 home victory over Pau on Saturday.

The home side started in emphatic fashion, opening up a 20-3 advantage after half an hour courtesy of tries from lock Cyril Chavet (14th minute) and full-back Romain Edmond-Samuel (21st minute). Fly-half Romain Sola added both conversions and a brace of penalties, but Pau gradually clawed their way back into the match after making wholesale changes at half-time.

South African fly-half Andre Hough landed successful penalties in the 50th and 57th minutes - to add to his earlier first-half effort - before replacement scrum-half Clément Darbo scored a last-minute try to secure a valuable defensive bonus for the visitors.

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Agen's win lifted them back above pre-weekend leaders RC Narbonne after the latter went down 15-3 at Aurillac.

Jeandre Fourie actually kicked a 20th-minute penalty to put the visitors ahead, but that was as good as it got for Narbonne as Aurillac slowly gained control. Two tries either side of half-time proved the turning point, with centres Germain Portero and Jakobus Kemp going over in the 39th and 42nd minutes respectively as the hosts opened up.

English fly-half Rory Teague kicked the second conversion and a later penalty to secure the win, even though Aurillac ended the match with 14 men following Mathieu Lescure's 74th-minute yellow card.

The defeat was only Narbonne's third of the season and saw them slip from first to third.

That allowed Lyon OU to climb above them into second position after they rallied from 18-9 down with 12 minutes to go to win 18-19 at La Rochelle.

Former Gloucester and London Irish winger James Bailey scored the match-winning try in the final minute for Lyon, but it still required Pierre-Yves Montagnat to slot the ensuing conversion to seal the dramatic late victory.

The match had initially been dominated by the kickers with La Rochelle's Benjamin Dambielle landing six successful penalties to put his side 18-9 up by the 68th minute, and seemingly on course for a regulation home win.

But they figured without Lyon's late rally and had to settle for just a defensive bonus in the end after Bailey's decisive try.

Grenoble slumped to their second successive defeat as they went down 28-18 at Tarbes.

Centre Wylie Human touched down for a ninth-minute try that helped put the visitors 13-9 ahead at the interval, but the home side fought back strongly in the second half with Krist Kopetsky landing four more penalties to his earlier three, and also converting Christophe André's 44th-minute try.

Grenoble did manage another score of their own, even reclaiming the lead temporarily after Roland Bernard's 49th-minute try, but Kopetsky's accuracy from the kicking tee proved too decisive as the Tarbes fly-half ended up with a 23-point match haul.

Yellow cards for Pierre Aguillon (35th minute) and Jonathan Pelissié (65th minute) further hindered Grenoble's efforts as they slipped out of the play-off zone, with Tarbes replacing them.

Union Bordeaux-Bègles got a much-needed win as they saw off Aix-en-Provence 21-10 to record only their third victory of the campaign.

Union were staring at an unwanted home defeat as they turned around 10-0 down following Konstantin Rachkov's 19th-minute try (and five points from the boot of Jordan Garnier), but they responded in style by clocking up 21 points after the break with winger Laurent Ferrères kick-starting the recovery with his 46th-minute try.

Henri-Pierre Vermis landed the conversion, and was on target again just four minutes later as Union claimed the lead following the award of a penalty try. Provence's problems were further compounded by flanker David Beun being yellow-carded, and Union notched try No 3 when South African lock Altenstadt Hulme powered over on the hour mark.

A late yellow for Julien Mallet proved irrelevant for the hosts, who climbed free of the dreaded drop zone and up to 13th on the back of their win.

Dax are back on the cusp of the play-off places following their 22-14 home win over FC Auch Gers.

The visitors held a 6-3 advantage as half-time approached, but two tries in five minutes from Fijian winger Ratu Naisa Narukutabua swung the match irreversibly towards Dax - and made Narukutabua the division's leading try-scorer in the process (with five).

Full-back Laurent Diaz added a third try 17 minutes from the end as Dax looked to claimed a precious attacking bonus, but  Frédéric Medves replied in kind for Auch to deny Thomas Lièvremont's team.

It wasn't enough to prevent the visitors leaving empty-handed, however, and this was Auch's third successive league defeat - a result which saw them slip down to 12th position after a promising start to the season.

Last year's beaten finalists Oyonnax followed up on last week's victory over SU Agen with an ultimately convincing 31-15 home win over Colomiers.

As with many of the weekend fixtures it was the away side which started brighter, opening up a 16-5 advantage by half-time thanks to tries from Julien Tourtoulou (in the 1st minute) and Pierre Belzunce (in the 26th). Frédéric Couzier added a conversion and a penalty, while Oyonnax's response was limited to a pair of Sylvan Tian penalties.

But the home side bounced back impressively after the break, with tries in the 44th and 48th minutes from Yohann Authier and Lukas Rapant as the gained control of the match. Tian added both conversions and a later penalty before going over himself for Oyonnax's third try on the hour mark to complete the scoring.

This latest win was Oyonnax's fifth in succession as they continue to build impressive momentum. Colomiers, on the other hand, have now slipped down into the relegation zone. They still remain well clear of basement club Lannemezan, however, as the latter slipped to their eighth successive defeat at the weekend.

At least this time they had the satisfaction of gaining a defensive bonus, but it looked as if it could have been so much more when they were leading Mont-de-Marsan 13-11 after an hour.

The match was evenly poised at 3-3 heading into half-time when Lannemezan centre Matthieu Céolin touched down for the game's opening try. Manuel Cascarra added the conversion to lift the home side 10-3 ahead, but Mont-de-Marsan replied through Jean-Marc Mazzonetto's try on 54 minutes as the visitors edged 10-11 in front.

Cascarra then slotted a 60th-minute penalty to reclaim the lead for the hosts, but Murphy Taele scored a second try for 'Les Montois'  just four minutes later, with Thibault Duvallet adding the conversion.

It remained that way until Cascarra's third successful penalty just four minutes from time, but it was a case of so near yet so far for CAL as they continue to search for their maiden ProD2 victory since gaining promotion from Fédérale 1.

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