When Fin Smith last played against Matthieu Jalibert, there was only one winner. England beat France, Smith was man of the match, and Jalibert was sent back to his club.
Smith made his first Test start that day at Twickenham. He has been England’s fly-half ever since, they have won all their games, and he is now a British & Irish Lion.
In the same period, Jalibert, 26, has been a stranger to the international stage. Yet he might well argue that February afternoon in the Six Nations had as galvanising an effect on him as it did his English counterpart.
“There’s not one element where Matthieu is not involved. Ever.”
In nine club games, Jalibert has scored 74 points, Union Bordeaux Bègles have reached their first Investec Champions Cup Final, and the 26-year-old has been in the form of his life.
“Tap into your search engine, ‘highlights, Bordeaux’,” says Benjamin Kayser, former France hooker turned Premier Sports pundit. “UBB are one of the best attacking sides in Europe, and there’s not one element where Matthieu is not involved. Ever.
“He’s either the final pass, he makes a 20-metre break, or he is creating something; foot, hand, step, whatever you want. Always involved. For the last three months, he’s been the talisman of this team.”
Which brings us nicely to the biggest club game of the season, Northampton Saints against Union Bordeaux Bègles and an eagerly awaited rematch between the playmaking pair.
“I love Fin Smith. I think he’s a great player,” says Kayser. “I’m really, really impressed with how well he can dictate the tempo of a game. But one-on-one, he will not make as much difference as Jalibert.”
Okay, let’s rewind a bit. To 2018 when Jalibert made his France debut as a teenager after just 15 league appearances for UBB. To 2020, when he caught the eye at Twickenham in a second or even third-string France side that gave England the fright of their lives in the final of the short-lived Autumn Nations Cup.
Impressive stuff, yet recency bias means most non-Top 14 observers, when asked for their opinion of Jalibert, default to this year’s Le Crunch clash. You remember the one: France somehow contrived to lose a game they would have won by half-time had they not dropped everything.
It was a calamitous team performance, and it coincided with Jalibert, who had controversially left the France squad in the autumn rather than warm the replacements’ bench against New Zealand, getting a rare start due to Romain Ntamack’s red card against Wales the previous week.
“It was his big game and he messed up,” says Kayser. “There was all this press about [Fabian] Galthie giving him a big hug and saying ‘we’re done, no more arguing between us. Now it’s your time to shine.’
“It was his moment and, genuinely, his defence cost us the game and a couple of decisions weren’t really there. He missed that opportunity and Fin Smith seized it.”
Viewed through that prism, tomorrow’s Principality Stadium clash, between two clubs who were given little chance of advancing from their semi-finals, is one Saints fans should be excited about. Only, Kayser has a warning.
“Mind-blowingly good”
“People in the UK judge Jalibert by his international performances, which is fair, because you follow Top-14 a little bit less,” he says. “But anybody who has followed him closely since he burst onto the scene four or five years ago will know he’s been unbelievably good. I mean, mind-blowingly good.
“It’s a bit like me judging Marcus Smith. International stage? Okay. Premiership? Whoa, outstanding. He does stuff that leaves you saying, ‘this guy is an absolute genius’.
“Jalibert is the same. He’s never been totally able to dominate the international stage because of the Romain Ntamack shadow – Ntamack likes to play with Antoine Dupont and vice versa.
“And because Galthie has a real sweet spot for that duo, it’s hard to go and perform somewhere where you don’t feel you’re totally the number one choice.
“But he is definitely the number one choice in Bordeaux. Guys love him. [Scrum-half] Maxime Lucu is a great complement to him, but also his team allows him to be the maverick that he is.
“I promise you, for the last three months Jalibert has been unbelievable. Semi-final against Toulouse, outstanding. Last week against Castres, outstanding.
“Okay, he does not defend like Owen Farrell, like Jonny Wilkinson in the good old days, or like Romain Ntamack. But in attack, unbelievable. His head-to-head against Fin Smith is a bit unfair, because it’s not really a head-to-head. They’re very different players, and it’s going to be a very different way of judging them.
“But, certainly, he’s a player for the big games. He’s been delivering in the big games and I think he’s very up for this one.”
An obvious question is whether one, or both, of these sides has already played its final. Saints beating Leinster in Dublin was one for the ages, Bordeaux trouncing Toulouse at their Matmut Atlantique stadium, not far behind.
It is entirely possible neither will be able to get back to those heights, both emotionally and physically. In Bordeaux’s case they had the memory of being routed 59-3 by Toulouse in last season’s Top-14 Final to fire them. They have no such lever to pull this time.
Northampton are back at full strength, with England fullback George Furbank making his first start since April and all four injury worries from last weekend passed fit. But, for them, the element of surprise has gone.
Kayser feels it is almost impossible to call and sides with Bordeaux on the grounds that, to his mind, they have an edge in power up front.
“But what worries me is that Saints, when they go to their behind-the-back balls, like they did against Leinster, they just keep on finding an overlap where you did not see it,” he adds.
“And Tommy Freeman against either Louis Bielle-Biarrey or Damian Penaud, up in the air.. I don’t want to see another Six Nations Fin Smith cross-kick to Freeman, on Bielle-Biarrey’s head, back inside and try. It just feels almost too easy.”
Back to that Twickenham game again, the one neither Jalibert, Bielle-Biarrey or Penaud care to be reminded of. England’s win that day had Northampton fingerprints all over it. Jalibert, for one, wants to set the record straight.
Benjamin Kayser is part of the Premier Sports TV team bringing live coverage across the UK of this Saturday’s box office Investec Champions Cup Final with a 10-strong team of rugby’s top presenters. Watch a packed 90-minute build-up from Principality Stadium starting at 1.30pm as Bordeaux Bègles take on Northampton Saints. Visit www.premiersports.com at just £11.99 a month.
Src: Planetrugby.com - https://www.planetrugby.com/news/former-france-star-benjamin-kayser-issues-warning-over-mind-blowingly-good-mathieu-jalibert-who-wants-to-set-the-record-straight-in-champions-cup-final
