“Toulouse, Messieurs-Dames, Toulouse, son cassoulet, his violets, son heavy artillery !!” We are no longer in the time of proper exclamations, which to talkative guides, who to railway stops, of course, no. However, in the Pink City, the tradition of the regular bombardment initiated in 1218 by the famous fatal stone, it is said, to the dreaded and feared Simon de Montfort, is good. From Friday 19 to Sunday 21 November, the proteges of Pierre-Noël Arcangeli and Philippe Rouquié did not find rivals to their measure on the launch pad installed in the suburbs of Dunkirk. The competition was fierce and the alert could not be hotter in the last four.

Diego Ivanovich harder than Lorraine steel

Metz, torturer of Toulouse in 2018 on the side of Montluçon, seemed well on its way to pass the second layer. It was without counting on this missile dispatched full iron by Diego Ivanovitch. Of course, Diego Ivanovitch, the young prodigy licensed in Rieumes, as powerful and precise – the elders will appreciate the wink – as Alain Laporte once faced the posts of the Moulin stadium. The starting shot came to deliver its verdict, as if it were written that nothing would stand in the way of a course that Pierre – Nöel Arcangeli himself qualifies as “fantastic”: “A big game on our part, it’s is right.”

Except for a few points left along the way here and there, Moulinois (4-0), Pornicais (same score), Ajacciens (3-1) were never able to prevent the Faurels (Bryan, Polo ), Rathqueber and their young partner to build up the essential trust capital synonymous with the home stretch accumulated under the best auspices.

Two years ago, Toulouse had slipped on the last step in favor of Clermont-Ferrand. In this third weekend of November, it is indeed an overall project, human as much as sporting, which was validated, Marseille, despite the presence of the illustrious Richard Hovaguimian, literally “exploding” (13- 2) during a triplet epilogue (1-1, then 3-1), masterfully conducted.

“We will remember everything, the organization, the atmosphere, the level of play”, concluded “the Archangel of Comminges” anxious, as we understand it, not to see the feat in question overused because of the absence, noticed it is true, of the Varois, Lacroix and Rocher (read elsewhere) cannot be everywhere at the same time.