Christophe Urios, UBB manager -

NICOLAS TUCAT / AFP

  • After the postponement of the match against Stade Français last week, UBB is kicking off its season this weekend against Brivistes in the Top 14.

  • Author of an excellent last season before the cut, the Bordelais have changed status.

  • If they lost Semi Radradra, the recruitment made it possible to gain even more power with the objective of being competitive in the league but also in the Champions Cup.

It did not take more to get it off its hinges.

Just "average" workout like that can happen from time to time.

Except with the meticulous manager of Union Bordeaux-Bègles, Christophe Urios.

And given his excellent results over the past ten years, no one will blame him for this big anger a few days away from taking over the Top 14 against Brive at the Chaban-Delmas stadium (Saturday, 6.15 pm): “We mustn't look out !

»He warns, still not calm, a little later in front of the journalists.

Before adding: "They will hear that one (this sentence)".

Christophe Urios knows the “little music” of the top level too well - as he likes to say - to be a little more on his guard at the start of this new season than when he arrived in Gironde a year ago.

At the same time, since the UBB has changed a lot and especially the view of its competitors on it after an almost perfect 2019/2020 financial year until the cut (leader of the Top 14 with 13 wins, 1 draw and 3 losses and a quarter of Challenge Cup finalist).

Result, 12 months later, everyone sees this favorite team for the title.

Suffice to say that it gently laughs the boss of the Union:

“We went from buffoons unable to qualify for the finals to favorites… It's smoke.

Why would we be more favorites than Toulouse,

 Clermont or Racing?

 ?

"

"The points, you earn them in the field, not in the newspapers"

Yet this label, we will have to do with it.

It doesn't matter if "it's a journalist thing" says the back Nans Ducuing or that some of his teammates like the third row Mahamadou Diaby do not even see "this change of status".

But, not everyone plays it tongue in cheek at Union Bordeaux-Bègles like President Laurent Marti at the microphone of RMC: “Yes, our status has changed after a long construction of the club, with the recruitment of 'a good squad and the arrival of Christophe Urios and his staff, the UBB has reached a milestone.

"A course yes," but from there to say that it places us in favorite, absolutely not ", procrastinates very quickly.

No question of igniting.

It's not the kind of house.

Bordeaux is your favorite for the coming season? Https: //t.co/6p9G0bK5kW

- Olympic Noon (@midi_olympique) August 31, 2020

Finally, as often the one who best expresses the general feeling at the club, is the manager of the UBB in the columns of the

Midi Olympique:

"You have to take it again with a lot of detachment and lucidity [this status], saying it values ​​last season's work and recruiting but that's it.

Points, you earn them on the field, not in the newspapers.

My feeling is there: we are happy, but basta.

It's a bit like the title of fall champion in fact: it's nice, but it doesn't bring in anything!

" Who says better ?

An even more powerful UBB

"Not disturbed" by this debate according to Nans Ducuing, the players of the Union Bordeaux-Bègles return to the fight "without any more pressure", but with as "engine" this frustration of not having finished this beautiful last season according to Mahamadou Diaby .

A fresh start with perhaps even better ammunition for the UBB.

It is also for this reason that many actors of the Top 14 place the Bordelais at the top of the bill even without Semi Radradra, perhaps the best three-quarters of the world who left the other side of the Channel in the 'offseason.

Bordeaux: To replace Semi Radradra, UBB is betting on New Zealand serial marker Ben Lam https://t.co/FnSSH8fgyt via @ 20minutesBord pic.twitter.com/bYo9qWvrbV

- 20minutesbordeaux (@ 20minutesbord) February 18, 2020

Moreover, even his ex-teammates minimize his departure: “There was not a game plan with Semi and another without him last season.

There was a game plan and it's still the same today, ”explains Nans Ducuing, while for Mahamadou Diaby,“ it's still the same team with a lot of character ”.

And surely a little more power.

¡Bienvenido @guidopetti!



The upcoming arrival at UBB of the 2nd Argentine international line of @JaguaresARG Guido Petti comes to close our recruitments for the 2020-2021 season.



Update on recruitment 👉 https://t.co/KCH4fxH0n3#iloveubb # top14 #bordeaux pic.twitter.com/2C3ExMuabq

- UBB Rugby (@UBBrugby) June 23, 2020

Indeed, some beautiful babies have landed at UBB like the young South African Joseph Dweba, the Argentinian international Guido Petti or the All Black Ben Lam.

They will not be too much for a workforce which will have to link the end of the Challenge Cup (semi-final against Edinburgh on September 19) and the start of the Champions Cup with of course the Top 14 in between. Urios could play for twenty-one straight weeks after the game against Stade Français was postponed last week.

But the Bordeaux manager "dreams always bigger" and to know, you have to do things "well in training".

A good hearer!

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  • Aquitaine

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