La Rochelle have become the first of this season’s three French semi-finalists in the Heineken Champions Cup. When Geoffrey Doumayrou crossed for the fifth try in the 64th minute, all resistance from Sale Sharks collapsed. Whoever lifts the trophy this season, there is no doubting Europe’s leading league.
The Top 14’s money helps but so does the wit and invention these teams are bringing to the field. Racing 92, Toulouse, Bordeaux-Bègles or Clermont Auvergne — none will take this sparkling side lightly.
If La Rochelle repeat the all-round brilliance that marked the middle phase of this game, they will trouble any team. With Uini Atonio such a destructive presence in a formidable scrum, they have a sound basis to push beyond the semi-finals. Their lineout is another trigger. With ball off the top and superb service from Tawera Kerr-Barlow, defences as good or better than Sale’s will struggle to suppress an attacking game that can play it any which way. Will Skelton and those outrageously subtle offloads for a giant, or the blistering balanced running of the more delicate Raymond Rhule. The threats come in all shapes and sizes.
Sale, fresh from their finest European hour against Scarlets in west Wales last Sunday, set out to negate their opponents and turn the match into as much of a breakdown battle as possible. As a result the game and the hosts took some time to find any sort of tempo. Sale would have been content enough with the staccato nature of a game dominated by the referee’s whistle and a fiercely competitive breakdown, an area in which Tom Curry was never less than brave and technically outstanding.
But the game ignited — out of control — on the half-hour. La Rochelle won a lineout off the top and the France No 8 Grégory Alldritt crossed the gainline with a cutting angle. Supplied with precise possession Ihaia West, the Kiwi fly half, lofted a high, diagonal kick that Brice Dulin, the France full back, reclaimed.
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Sale were still rushing backwards in retreat as the fly half chipped an even better right-to-left kick. Victor Vito, the former All Black, was waiting out wide. After a stunning combination of footwork and offloading, Alldritt was in support to finish what his run had begun. Ronan O’Gara, the La Rochelle head coach and former Ireland No 10, would have appreciated the brutal accuracy of his fly half’s role in the try.
The score signalled a superb last ten minutes of first-half action. Curry, a constant presence in the face of the French team, forced a sliced clearance. Sale won a penalty and cut the lead to three points.
Faf de Klerk had been his normal feisty self, varying his game cleverly, but in the 36th minute a typical exploration of the blind side ended up with a seven-point shift in favour of the home side as Dillyn Leyds knocked the Springbok’s pass backwards, gathered and sprinted half the length of the field for a superbly converted try.
Sale struck back with their own score. Byron McGuigan rounded Rhule and fed an inside pass for Sam James to take and score after good initial work by the centre himself and Curry. At 18-16, Sale had given themselves a lifeline at half-time.
So we thought. Rhule, guilty of missing the Scotland wing for that try, glided off another well-worked lineout to dummy his way past McGuigan and reassert the nine-point lead. That splendid first-phase try was a minute into the second half.
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Worse followed for Sale. The full back Simon Hammersley slipped as he covered a kick. Rhule rounded him, kicked with control and dived over for their fourth try.
Doumayrou added another pair of tries, both of them easy on the eye, before McGuigan scored the least consoling of tries for Sale. La Rochelle have won all four of their Champions Cup games this season. It will take a good side to halt that run.
La Rochelle: Tries Alldritt (28min), Leyds (36), Rhule (41, 51), Doumayrou (61, 69) Cons West 3 Pens West (11, 21, 65)
Sale Sharks: Tries S James (40), McGuigan (76) Cons MacGinty Pens MacGinty (9, 26, 33)
La Rochelle B Dulin; D Leyds, G Doumayrou (J Favre 71), L Botia (P Aguillon 65), R Rhule; I West, T Kerr-Barlow (J Lebail 71); R Wardi (D Priso 54), P Bourgarit (F Bosch 71), U Atonio (A Joly 58), R Sazy (T Lavault 65), W Skelton, G Alldritt, K Gourdon (W Liebenberg 61), V Vito.
Sale S Hammersley; B McGuigan, S James, R Janse van Rensburg (R du Preez 57), M Yarde (L James 71); AJ MacGinty, F de Klerk (R Quirke 57); B Rodd (R Harrison 53), A van der Merwe (C Langdon 62), WG John (C Oosthuizen 53), J Wiese (J Phillips 66), J Beaumont, J-L du Preez (C Nild 66), T Curry, D du Preez.
Referee A Brace (Ire).
