Pro D2 (R4): three unbeaten sides, two wins in the 79th minute

Two games in a row, the same minute decided everything. And behind them, a table that is starting to split the teams that win from the teams that lose narrowly.

Two games won in the 79th minute

The round turned twice on the same kick, in the same minute. On Thursday night in Aurillac, John Cooney won it for Brive with a 79th-minute penalty, 28-29, two minutes after the home side had gone ahead.

On Friday in Agen, Luka Matkava did exactly the same for Oyonnax, 17-19, also in the 79th minute. The Georgian goal-kicker landed five of his seven attempts and scored 14 of his side’s 19 points. Oyonnax trailed for almost the whole game and had two players sin-binned inside the first eleven minutes, Louis Morland and then Phoenix Battye.

Both teams are unbeaten, and both won away from home.

Three unbeaten sides within a point

Oyonnax, Provence Rugby and Brive have four wins from four games and are separated by a single point: 18, 17 and 17. Provence Rugby won 23-27 at Valence-Romans, their fourth win and third on the road.

Behind them, Biarritz and Montauban follow on 14 and 13 points, with three wins each.

Nevers: four defeats, nine points in total

This is the strangest line in the table. Nevers have not won a game, yet they have four points, all of them losing bonus points, one from each of their four defeats.

The detail is worth a look: beaten 25-21 at home by Montauban, 28-26 at Narbonne, 21-20 at Béziers, then 22-20 by Biarritz on Friday. A combined margin of nine points across four defeats, an average of two and a quarter points per game lost.

No other club in the division has done that. Nevers are still bottom, though: level on points with Béziers, they are separated by the head-to-head record, and Béziers won their Round 3 meeting 21-20. Winning just one of those four games would put Nevers on seven points, level with Valence-Romans.

Colomiers answer with ten tries

Colomiers had lost their first three games and hosted Dax with no margin for error. They responded with the biggest score of the round, 66-21, and ten tries.

Thibault Debaes scored 21 points on his own, with eight conversions and a try, and Martin Dulon crossed three times. The evening ended with a red card for Federico Lavanini in the 79th minute, the only sending-off of the round.

Colomiers climb to 6 points. Dax have now conceded 170 points in four rounds, the second-worst total in the division after Béziers.

Narbonne lead 28-0, then survive a scare

Racing Club Narbonnais scored four tries in seven minutes to lead 28-0 after twenty minutes against Soyaux-Angoulême. They eventually won 31-26, after conceding fourteen penalties according to L’Indépendant and letting their opponents score four tries of their own.

No other team scored so much in so little time this round, and no other team saw a twenty-eight-point lead shrink to five.

Five away wins out of eight

Five of the eight games went the way of the visiting side: Brive at Aurillac, Grenoble at Nice 33-37, Biarritz at Nevers, Provence Rugby at Valence-Romans and Oyonnax at Agen.

The three home wins were all comfortable: Colomiers 66-21, Montauban 50-21 against Béziers and Narbonne 31-26. In total, 470 points and 60 tries in eight games, just over seven tries per match.

The table after four rounds