Toulouse. AS Castillonnès Cahuzac Lalandusse, a first-degree family club
On the border of Lot-et-Garonne and Dordogne, the ASCCL, which evolves in Regional 3, cultivates a strong family spirit. For good reason, since its creation, the Prat family has been omnipresent there.
In the early 1960s, the villages of Castillonnès (1,400 inhabitants), Cahuzac (300 inhabitants) and Lalandusse (200 inhabitants) each had their own football team. “The derbies were something…”, remembers Jean-Jacques Prat, at the time a kid at the edge of the handrail. In the Cahuzac team, training felt like a Sunday meal. Two families, almost alone, made up the workforce: the Prats and the Filipozzis.
After the merger of the three villages within the ASCCL, in 1963, the Prat family has always been the base of local football in this land of rugby. The second generation, that of Jean-Jacques and his brothers François and Eric, took over. “We were six Prats with the cousins”, remember the three brothers. Even today, the Prats are everywhere in the club. Jean-Jacques was president from 1997 to 2004 and still follows the team faithfully. François is a trainer, his son Hugo is a stopper. Éric writes the match reports for La Dépêche du Midi, his son Arnaud has been the team’s goalscorer for twenty years.
300 km every weekend to defend the colors of the club
This family has a real visceral attachment to this club. When he was a player, Eric Prat was a postman in Bordeaux. But every weekend, he took advantage of his car to play in “green and white”. “It’s the love of the club, it’s our stronghold”, he is almost surprised when asked why these 300 km weekly. His son, Arnaud, was raised in this “family spirit”, steeple, even “uprooted” in Bruges until he was 11 years old. Like his uncle François, he had the skills and the opportunities to play at a higher level. But he never left his club. Moreover, at 25, for professional reasons, he also migrated to the Bordeaux region. And like his father before him, every weekend for fifteen years, he takes his car to play with his “childhood friends”. “It’s the family, it’s the club…”. The words of the father are found in those of the son.
Next season, Arnaud will retire. Only one Prat remains on the field: Hugo. “But the family is still there, specifies this one. Tanguy Deschamps, Quentin Bouyne, Julien Vettorel are my cousins!” The ASCCL cultivates this family spirit, this football of the fields which finds it difficult to compete with that of the cities and suffers, like its cousin rugby, the loss of interest of the young generation. “In our time, there was only football and rugby, explain the three brothers. It was our social bond, we lived together all the time by and for football. Today, young people who parent at school, in Toulouse or Bordeaux, does not come back or play much on weekends. There is the price of diesel, a loss of the spirit of competition and the internet…”
Will there be a 4th generation of Prats at ASCCL?
Times have changed but the club is resisting. 147 licensees, with the resurgence of a women’s team. “In the evening, the club house is full, it’s important”. Sunday, despite the heavy defeat against Montpon-Ménesplet (2-5) and a return to the District which is no longer in doubt, the family spirit was still there.
Hugo looks at the pictures of teams attached to the wall. “There, it’s my father and my uncle, there Arnaud”. Will there be a fourth generation of Prats to take up the torch in a few years? Arnaud’s son, 3 years old, is already in the ball. “A real Prat”, smiles his father. But who should not wear the colors of the ASCCL. Jean-Jacques, who had only daughters, then tapped his nephew Hugo on the shoulder: “We’re counting on you!”