Review: Stade Francais 30-30 Clermont Auvergne
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Review: Stade Francais 30-30 Clermont Auvergne
This one was quite an intense affair between two very attacking minded teams. Stade Francais started very strongly with Geoffrey Doumayrou getting two almost identical tries by chipping ahead and regathering to dot down. Morgan Parra limited Stade's lead with the boot, scoring a couple of penalties.
Next to get on the score-sheet was Djibril Camara. He went over in the corner, after getting on the end of a pass from the man of the hour Doumayrou. The 26 year old, former Montpellier star made Clermont flanker Peceli Yato look silly, using his fantastic feet to bamboozle the defender, before drawing the last man and offloading to the winger, who dived over.
Clermont responded with Paul Jedrasiak crashing over as part of an effective maul from the lineout. Parra converted one more penalty before the break, to leave the score 20-16 in Stade's favour at half time.
The 2nd half was all Clermont's as they pulled into the lead with penalties from both Parra and fullback Scott Spedding. Plisson put Stade back in front with a penalty to make it 23-22. Spedding again kicked from distance to give the lead to Clermont, before Fritz Lee scored an opportunist try from a messy lineout to extend the lead to 7.
Stade did not lie down however, as Jeremy Sinzelle made a great break before offloading to speedster Waisea Vuidravuwalu, who scored in the corner. Plisson converted the difficult kick to bring the sides level and that is the way the game finished.
30-30 was probably a fair result. Stade played out of their skin in the first half and dominated their visitors. However the second half was played at a much slower pace which suited Clermont more than their hosts. Stade were lucky to come away with the draw in the end. Clermont are still unbeaten in this year's Top 14, with 2 draws and a win on the road. Stade will be disappointed that they couldn't maintain their high pace game throughout the game and come away with the win.
Standout performers today were Geoffrey Doumayrou for Stade and Morgan Parra, who kept his Clermont side in the game with a great kicking performance.
