Seven and a half years later, the wound is not closed. Guest this Wednesday of the new sport and business podcast En Terrain Conquis, where he returned to his sporting career and that, less known, of business manager, Maxime Mermoz let burst this intense frustration born of his exclusion from the France group under the Philippe Saint-André era. Especially the fact of having left him at the quay for the 2015 World Cup in England despite a sporting level at its zenith near Toulon, where he played a big role in obtaining the three Champions Cup in a row (2013, 2014, 2015) and the Brennus Shield of 2014. The Vosgien, who has forgotten nothing of these painful moments, therefore took out the heavy weapon and fired on sight.
“If I told you about the speeches and how we trained, it was a joke. And he (Philippe Saint-André, editor’s note) tried every possible and imaginable guy not to make me play. He didn’t know how explain it so he looked like an idiot, Mermoz thunders. Where he made the most ridicule of himself was when he didn’t take me to the 2015 Tournament saying that it was a sporting choice when I am elected best center every year! He says that I am a bad guy and I was such a bad guy that a week later he has to call me back and even names me captain of the three-quarters! Even Thierry Dusautoir came to me thank me by telling me that I had awakened all that.”
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“That’s when I said to myself that French rugby was a real hoax”
A hope of return to grace destroyed with the announcement of the final list for the World Cup. “I put the dots on the ‘i’ during the 6 Nations, says the four-time French champion, also winner of the European Cup three times. Everything is going well in the league, and the day before, Pierre Mignoni (assistant coach in Toulon, editor’s note) said to me: ‘I had them, there will be no surprise.’ There I said to myself: ‘Damn, I fought for 4 years to impose myself!’ And finally Pierrot said to me the next day: ‘Sorry Max, you’re not even among the reservists.’ I thought it was a hidden camera! In fact, he only took his friends, those who he knew he would put starters and those who would be happy to be substitutes. That’s when I said to myself that French rugby was a real hoax and that they shouldn’t be surprised after They had shitty results.”
Maxime Mermoz, with the French team, in 2014
Credit: Getty Images
Mermoz goes even further in the attack by recounting their reunion : “We met again a month later at Jonny Wilkinson’s Testimonial in Monaco. He passes in front of me, walks and lowers his head, not even a hello, nothing… There in my head I say to myself: ‘I knew it was a coward, a coward, especially since he had called me a mole when he invited journalists on weekdays to eat at the restaurant to feed them and make sure they were nice to him. of the character…’.” An outing with acid against the current reigning French champion coach with Montpellier, without concession, extracted from a long exchange where Guy Novès also takes it for his rank.
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