"It's not the ideal preparation but it's the one we have chosen": recovered and hardly tender with his men after their loss at the Aimé-Giral stadium (22-15), manager Christophe Urios was in better moods Wednesday during the first press briefing of the week organized by the UBB where he presented himself alone.

A rarity this season.

"It's their choice," he said.

"I've never banned players from going to a press conference. Probably because they want to tighten up. And that's good. I think they've had a very positive reaction since Monday. I find them changed, much more actors. Destiny, you can make it move, provided you are alive. I find that, this week, they are alive, much more than at the end of last week.

And he, voluntarily further back, as he had hinted in Catalonia after his post-match projection.

"I sent messages through the press on Sunday evening asking them to go ahead," he explains.

"I have the weakness to think that during the final stages, we, the staff, we have to be in the wheel of the players. It's up to them to take the trick, it's up to the leaders to pass in front. From Monday morning , they came to me saying they wanted to do things. I didn't have a meeting on Monday and Tuesday. They were the ones who did the meetings."

"Fragile and capable of anything"

Urios did not remain inactive, however.

He participated in a + council of elders + with his leaders, received his internationals Cameron Woki and Matthieu Jalibert whose performance he had pointed out in Perpignan.

"They are our best players. When they are not good, I say it. When they are good, I say it too. I don't see why it would only be one way."

Cameron Woki (left) and Matthieu Jalibert during the Top 14 match against Lyon on May 21, 2022 in Bordeaux.

Their behavior was publicly judged below their international status by Christophe Urios Thibaud MORITZ AFP / Archives

"And I keep the prerogative of team composition," said the Unionist manager with a smile barely chasing his questions.

And they are many.

"It's the first time that I have approached a final phase in these conditions," he admits.

"We are both fragile and capable of anything at the same time. You don't really know how we're going to react."

Christophe Urios, manager of Union Bordreaux-Bègles, on April 24, 2022, before a Top 14 match in Montpellier.

"This is the first time that I have approached a final phase in these conditions", he confides Pascal GUYOT AFP / Archives

Kind of like last season.

In April 2021, the dynamic was already uncertain when approaching the final stages of the European Cup with this worrying setback conceded at home against La Rochelle (11-26).

Two weeks later, the UBB dismissed Racing, already on the wire (24-21) in the quarter-finals.

It was just as much in June before the Top 14 barrage against Clermont after two defeats suffered in Toulon (25-19) and against Toulouse still at home (21-10), which had not prevented him from spinning in half (victory over ASM 25-16).

So levers, "solutions, I have plenty," says Urios.

"Are they going to work? I don't know. Not saying anything for two days, that was one. But the verdict, the justice of the peace, is Sunday. If it goes well for us, I'm going to keep my mouth shut until the end of the season. But you're going to miss that."

© 2022 AFP