Agen 24 – 13 Biarritz: Agen Hold Strong Against Basque Assaults
Rarely this season have we seen SUA with so few offensive weapons. Agen spent most of their time defending against a Biarritz team that tried a lot. “It was complicated. Of course, we prefer to have the ball, to keep it. But we were solid in defense. We showed that defensively, we were present, capable of repelling the opposing players. Even if they won a few encounters, we knew how to stay together, connected. We made significant efforts on long defensive sequences, and we held up well,” summarized Lucas Martins, one of the heroes of the match.
However, the start of the match seemed to herald a fairly calm evening, with a clinical Sporting side, securing the bonus point after over half an hour of play. But Giorgi Nutsubidze’s try at the end of the first half, and especially the start of the second half by the Basques, disrupted Agen’s plans.
“We lacked precision. The problem was the first ten to fifteen minutes after halftime. We need to do better after the break because before halftime, we were good. We have to continue to play,” regretted Ollie Cummins. A feeling shared by coach Boris Bouhraoua who said, “We didn’t always play in the right zones. We could have played more around the rucks. We swept the field too much. We also didn’t provoke the third line of defence. We hesitated, and we didn’t play enough within the advantage line.”
Even on carried balls, the fatal weapon of Clement Martinez’s teammates, the Biarritz players did not find a way through. Agen stood firm, being deprived of the ball before securing a bonus point with a final push from Martins. The scoreline was severe but indicative of the difference between two teams with opposite dynamics.
Without convincing, Agen assured the essentials. “It was the goal before the match to get all five points. It’s done, but it’s true that we lacked a lot of precision. In the second half, I don’t know how many times we entered their 22 meters without scoring,” noted Martins before concluding: “We were really looking for a try because we were three tries to one. In the end, we couldn’t score, we lost balls, and we lacked patience. We will have to work on precision in the scoring zone to then be freer and score more points.” A clear area for improvement for SUA. The theme of the week is known at Armandie before the “final” against Oyonnax.
