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B. Delguy (40+31', 71'), T. Lanen (50'), Y. Fall (60')
Tries
P. Abadie (69')
H. Plummer (51', 61')
Conversions
I. West (69')
H. Plummer (15', 44')
Penalties
L. Carbonel (5', 28', 47')
This was the response ASM Clermont Auvergne owed their coach after Lyon. The difference wasn’t flash or volume of possession; it was edge in the contact zones and a willingness to turn scraps into points out wide. Four tries to one told of a side that, for once, chose accuracy over excess and trusted its finishers.
It also said something uncomfortable about Stade Français Paris. They had field position and punch in the back three, yet left with a 30–16 defeat because the lineout spluttered and the ball kept dying on the floor. When the game asked for control, Paris offered chaos. Clermont were happy to pick through it.
The hinge was obvious: Tanginoa Halaifonua’s yellow just after the break. Clermont had led through a Bautista Delguy strike in first-half stoppage time, but the contest was tight and tetchy. With Stade down a flanker, Clermont doubled down at the ruck and went two scores clear in a 10-minute burst — Thibaud Lanen, on at lock, hammering over, then Yerim Fall finishing a right-edge movement. That was the one period where the gain line and the scoreboard moved in the same direction for the hosts.
Look at the numbers and the pattern sharpens. Paris had more possession and beat more defenders, but they coughed up 18 turnovers and hit barely 60% at their own lineout. Clermont, stung by Christophe Urios’s midweek criticism of “a lack of engagement in the contact areas,” won 10 turnovers and survived a messy penalty count by making their plays in the red zone count.
CARRIES
CLEAN BREAK
DEFENDER BEATEN
TACKLE
MISSED TACKLE
TURNOVER WON
TURNOVERS CONCEDED
PENALTY CONCEDED
YELLOW CARD
POSSESSION
SCRUMS
LINEOUTS
The opening half summed up both stories. Louis Carbonel kept Stade in touch from the tee, even had a nudge at a drop that tailed off, and Samu Ezeala and Léo Barre were dangerous on kick return. But two breakdown steals and a spilled throw undid promising entries, and Delguy’s poacher’s finish on the stroke of the interval shifted the mood inside Marcel-Michelin. Clermont didn’t need many phases — they just needed the right ones.
After the card, Lanen’s impact mattered. He replaced Darcy Swain and immediately gave Clermont punch on carries and maul defense, then finished for 16–9 before Harry Plummer nudged the extras. Plummer’s kicking — two penalties and two conversions — steadied them when Paris threatened to drag the game back into a shoot-out. Delguy’s second, on 71 minutes, killed the chase after Paul Abadie had briefly trimmed it to nine with a sharp support line off the bench.
Individually, Marcos Kremer’s 17 tackles told you where Clermont’s appetite really returned. Etienne Fourcade’s early wobble at the set-piece was corrected by Barnabé Massa’s seven clean throws, and Regis Montagne and Thomas Ceyte added honest, front-foot carries that kept Plummer on the front foot often enough. On the other side, Ezeala and Barre made ground in broken field, Carbonel landed three penalties and looked busy around the edge, but none of it translated into multi-phase pressure because the next set-piece, or the next ruck, failed them.
Does 30–16 flatter the winners? Not really. Four tries to one, two of them in that window with a man advantage, reflects how ruthless Clermont were at key moments. But the balance sheet isn’t spotless. Fourteen penalties, a losing scrum count and 30 missed tackles will bite them in a different fixture. The difference from last week in Lyon was the work over the ball; ten turnovers won is exactly the “engagement in the contact areas” Urios demanded. As he said after Round 1: “I ruled out the weather and pointed instead to a lack of engagement in the contact areas.” That box, at least, was ticked.
For Paris, this was a self-inflicted step back. The yellow was needless, the lineout malfunctions persistent, and with Yoan Tanga carried hard but rarely over the gain line, they never built the kind of field position they enjoyed at Jean-Bouin. The attack has teeth — Abadie’s cameo and Tani Vili’s traffic-shifting carries proved as much — but it needs a platform and better ruck detail. Eighteen turnovers and a malfunctioning set-piece will undo anyone away from home.
Clermont bank a first win and, more importantly, evidence that the breakdown can be their friend again. Bayonne away will test their discipline and scrum; tidy those and the back three will keep finding edges. Stade leave with a clear to-do list: fix the lineout, tidy the ruck, and keep 15 on the park. The attacking threats are there; until the nuts and bolts are, days like this will keep getting away.
