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Rabah Slimani, « flatté » d’être tant courtisé

Rabah Slimani (Clermont) (Photo by John Berry/Getty Images)

On peut entamer une nouvelle carrière à 34 ans et Rabah Slimani compte bien le prouver. Le pilier droit vétéran de Clermont est annoncé la saison prochaine au Leinster, même si rien n’est encore signé.

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Après huit ans passés au Stade Français et 7 ans à l’ASM, le natif de Sarcelles se prépare à se lancer dans un nouveau défi et à s’engager avec le troisième club de sa carrière.

« N’importe quel club, ça aurait pu être un super défi. J’arrive à un âge où on pense que je dois me mettre à la retraite. Mais voilà, je ne vais pas le cacher, il y a plusieurs clubs qui étaient intéressés. C’est plutôt flatteur pour moi », a-t-il confié à nos confrères de France Bleu Pays d’Auvergne.

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Damian de Allende talks about the plaudits heaped on him by his teammates

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Damian de Allende talks about the plaudits heaped on him by his teammates

« Après, l’ASM ça reste quand même un club qui m’a fait grandir aussi. Je suis arrivé ici, j’avais 27 ans, j’en ai 34 aujourd’hui. J’ai vécu toutes les émotions avec ce club et ça a été incroyable, ça a été exceptionnel. Malheureusement, on n’a pas su trouver d’accord. Et c’est pour ça aussi que j’ai dit que je quittais le club à la fin de la saison. »

Le terme de la saison arrive et Rabah Slimani a battu son record de participations avec 32 rencontres dont 26 en Top 14 – 1311 minutes jouées. Le plus qu’il avait joué en Top 14 jusque-là, c’était 24 matchs lors de la saison 2012-2013.

Pas le premier choix du Leinster

Rabah Slimani (57 sélections avec le XV de France entre 2013 et 2019) n’était pas le premier choix du Leinster qui lorgnait plus sur le joueur australien Taniela Tupou qui aurait pu être sur le marché des transferts après la fin de la franchise des Melbourne Rebels. Cependant, le Wallaby devrait rejoindre les Waratahs pour la saison 2025 du Super Rugby.

C’est alors que le Leinster, en quête d’un pilier, se serait tourné vers Rabah Slimani, alors courtisé par d’autres clubs français. Il est en passe de devenir le premier Français à jouer pour le Leinster si la signature se confirme avec la province irlandaise.

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Dans le dernier épisode de "Walk the Talk", Jim Hamilton s'entretient avec Damian de Allende, double champion du monde de rugby, au sujet des Springboks, en particulier de la Coupe du Monde de Rugby 2023 et de la série à venir contre l'Irlande. Regardez l'épisode gratuitement dès maintenant sur RugbyPass TV.

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Flankly 1 hour ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

4 Go to comments
N
Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
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