Glas (Bourgoin): “A slightly strange championship”

Sixth in the Nationale after six rounds, Bourgoin-Jallieu beat Suresnes 34-12 on Saturday 3 October, with the try bonus point, and travel to Orléans on Friday 9 October. Their coach, Stéphane Glas, takes stock. Interview.

Bourgoin’s start to the season comes down to six games: a win over Marcq-en-Barœul (25-20), a defeat at Massy, a draw with Chambéry (27-27), a loss at Périgueux (27-23), then two wins, at Rennes (35-29) and against Suresnes. Their season has one peculiarity: the Nationale grows from 14 to 16 clubs in 2027-28, and no club will go down at the end of this campaign. Only promotion is at stake, which the former international calls “a slightly strange championship”.

Name, first name, age, occupation?

Glas, Stéphane, 52, head coach of Club Sportif de Bourgoin-Jallieu in the Nationale. (37 caps for France, 9 tries between 1996 and 2001, Grand Slams in 1997 and 1998, World Cup runner-up in 1999, three-time French champion with Stade Français in 2003, 2004 and 2007, editor’s note.)

A squad averaging under 24

How do you rate your players’ start to the season?

It’s only the start of the season, but it’s pretty good, even if we’re a little frustrated by the first block. The performances have been fairly good but, in terms of results, I don’t think we’ve picked up enough points. We’re on the right track: we went and won in Rennes and, this weekend, we won with the try bonus point. To keep it short, I’m rather happy with the start of the season.

Your players have looked serious and focused. Is that something you emphasised?

Yes. We have a very young team, we really recruited young this season, with an average age under 24. They’re ambitious. We have a lot of players on loan from Top 14 or Pro D2 sides. Then we promoted young players from the academy, and we also recruited young players from outside. Today we really have a group that listens, that wants to improve, that has high individual goals, and inevitably that shows collectively. That’s why we have a serious team.

“A cluster” between Lyon, Oyonnax and Grenoble

Stéphane, you’re in an area that has always been highly competitive: Lyon, Oyonnax, Bourg-en-Bresse, Chambéry, Geneva, Grenoble…

Yes, it’s a rugby region, you can almost stretch it to Clermont, two hours away by road. There’s competition, whether in Pro D2, with Oyonnax, Grenoble, Valence Romans… And, as you said, Chambéry, us, Vienne. It creates emulation, it’s a cluster, something that helps quality emerge, having lots of places of excellence like that. Some things are rather positive for us, others less so, but that’s part of the game. There’s all the work Pascal Papé does with the youth teams: he’s recruited well, and some of our youth teams are doing very well.

Do you attract the attention of the “big clubs”?

You get raided a bit by the big teams, because they spot talent very early. But, on the other hand, it also gives us a very good relationship with those clubs, who loan us players because they play at the highest level. All in all, it works out for us, but it’s true that there are a lot of players in the region. We’re doing fine: it’s good for us, but also for the big clubs, who come and pick from our youth teams. It has to be win-win, of course. We try to balance things so that everyone gets something out of it over several seasons.

No relegation, only one race: promotion

You’re living through an odd season with the overhaul of the competitions. How do you feel about it?

That’s why we’ll try to stay with the leading pack for as long as possible, so that it’s a championship that gives us a bit of adrenaline. But it was necessary: the people in charge wanted to switch to the same format as the Pro D2, with 16 clubs. It’s happening this year, they’d been talking about it for two years, it had to be done. We’ll take stock at Christmas, at the halfway point, to see who is completely out of it and who can still qualify. But it’s true that it’ll make for a slightly strange championship.

It might sometimes produce rounds that are a bit chaotic, with teams that have nothing left to play for, who rotate their squads or ease off from one weekend to the next. But last year, around the halfway point, it was a bit the same when Tarbes and then Niort folded: no relegation until the end of February.

“Bourgoin in the Pro D2 is not a pipe dream”

You lived through the end of amateur rugby, the first professional seasons, then the “metropolisation” of rugby. What is CSBJ’s goal when the big cities dominate?

Not so long ago, a lot of players from Bourgoin-Jallieu were playing for France. There’s still a lot of rugby in our region, the chance to pick up good players around us. Maybe one day soon we’ll see players from our academy at that level again, perhaps for France. Pascal Papé and his whole staff are doing very good groundwork, from the youngest players up to the under-23s. We have to feed the first team, that’s important.

And at the same time, we really have the facilities to go up to the Pro D2: the stadium, the hospitality boxes, the training pitch, the gym, the video room. It’s not luxury, but it’s a place where we can work in peace and really do everything. We’ll have to secure a top-six place in the Nationale on a regular basis. I think that today the club won’t go any higher, we have to be clear about that: the big cities, the metropolises, are the ones calling the shots. But I think Bourgoin in the Pro D2 is not a pipe dream.