Perpignan In focusPhilip Dine sheds light on a Catalan club which has endured some dark days
If Stade Toulousain can be regarded as European rugby's equivalent of Real Madrid, Perpignan may be likened to the Spanish club's great rival, Barcelona. To begin with, the Perpignan team relies to a significant extent on imported players, much as do the soccer giants based just the other side of the Spanish frontier. In Perpignan's - admittedly, more modest - case, the professional era has seen a wide variety of nationalities recruited to its ranks, including Italians, Argentinians, Australians, and New Zealanders. Not forgetting the team's Canadian-born Irishman, Phil Murphy, at number eight.
Perhaps more significantly, and again like Barca, Perpignan has for many years been a focus for Catalan regionalism. The rugby side's "blood and gold" vertical stripes are the same symbol of cultural affiliation as that on the club badge of Barcelona. In this regard, Perpignan also resembles the great Basque rugby clubs located at the other end of the Pyrenees mountain chain, such as Bayonne and Biarritz. Rugby in Perpignan, like football in Barcelona, serves to keep alive a contested identity in a region that straddles modern national borders.
However, if Perpignan has come to prominence, it is only after the better part of half a century of relative obscurity. As its name suggests, the Union Sportive Arlequins Perpignan sprang from an amalgamation of two clubs that had won the French championship on three occasions (in 1914, 1921, and 1925). The USAP, founded in 1933, added a further three titles in 1938, 1944, and 1955. However, for the next 40 years the club failed to secure another trophy, until finally winning the French Cup in 1994. Now in its third season in the European Cup, the USAP has again made it to the semi-final stage, just as it did in 1999.
One indication of Perpignan's importance as a rugby centre, even during its leanest years - throughout which it maintained its position in the national elite - might be to list the club's most famous players - Jo Maso, an international star of the 1960s and 1970s, and forever associated with the French tradition of running rugby. More recently, Maso has worked with Jean-Claude Skrela and Bernard Laporte as manager of the national team. Another former hero is the second row forward Jean-François Imbernon, a fixture in France's Grand Slam winning side of 1977.
However, such an inventory would only scratch the surface of a local rugby culture that not only has its glorious traditions, but also a distinctly darker past. Three wars have left their mark on Perpignan. The impact of the Great War on the club, and on the rugby communities of France, may be appreciated by considering a symbolic game. In 1914, the Catalans of Perpignan met the Basques of Bayonne, the reigning national champions, in the quarter-finals of the French championship. A fast and furious affair, the match was drawn after four periods of extra time, with Perpignan going on to win narrowly in a replay. This clash is still remembered, but not for sporting reasons. For no fewer than 15 of the 30 players who appeared on the pitch that day died in the 1914-18 conflict.
If anything, the 1939-45 hostilities were to prove even more harrowing for Perpignan. The international isolation of the French game throughout the 1930s had opened the door to the professional spectacle of rugby league. This new drain on the beleaguered rugby union's resources was widely resented. This was true in Perpignan, where a number of successful league sides had been established, including the celebrated XIII Catalan club. Tensions focused on the recruitment of established union players by the league clubs, tearing apart the community and even families.
Following the military defeat of France in 1940, the Vichy regime began settling scores. In the sporting sphere, Lieut-Colonel Joseph "Jep" Pascot, an international outhalf with the Perpignan club in the 1920s, became minister for sport. He was responsible for banning rugby league and the seizure of club and federal assets, together with the forcible reunification of the two codes. With his support, Pascot's own Perpignan club again became a major power. The USAP was assisted by the enforced return from rugby league of the great Catalan player Puig-Aubert, a superb attacking full back whose inspirational play helped the club to victory in the 1943-44 national championships.
The third "war" to affect rugby in Perpignan was a direct consequence of its traumatic wartime experiences. The liberation of France in the summer of 1944 brought not only a lifting of the ban on rugby league, but also a series of reprisals against union clubs. Particularly targeted were the facilities of the USAP, Pascot's base.
Perpignan has come a long way since those dark days and its return to the front rank of the French game is very much to be welcomed. The Catalan flag may have been battered and even abused at times in the club's history, but it now flies proudly again over what is still one of the most distinctive outposts of French rugby excellence.
Philip Dine is college lecturer in French at the National University of Ireland, Galway. He is the author of French Rugby Football: A Cultural History (Oxford, Berg, 2001). He is currently researching a history of French colonial sport.
