Just three years ago he toured the courts of Buenos Aires with Newman’s t-shirt. Today he is about to make his debut for the powerful France team. A line that synthesizes the meteoric career of Thibaud Flament, although it does not quite do justice to his globetrotting life.
Flament will be one of France’s starting second lines in Saturday’s game against the Pumas. His great present in Toulouse earned him the first call to Les Bleus by coach Fabien Galthié for this November window. The striking thing is that he learned to play that position during his one-year stay in Argentina playing the Top 12 of the URBA for Newman, where he came from the hand of the former pillar of the Pumas Marcos Ayerza. He was studying at Leicester and playing opening game, but at a height of 2m he was advised to become a forward. To perfect himself in the pack, he chose the Argentine school.
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The journey between his native Paris, Benavídez, and the premiere at the Stade de France is far from unambiguous. When he was newborn he went to live in Singapore and spent his childhood in Belgium, where he began playing rugby at the Association Sportive de l’Université de Bruxelles (ASUB) and became fanatical with the oval. In an attempt to develop himself in this sport, he went to study International Trade in England, at Loughborough University, near Leicester, which has an elite rugby training center. There, coach George Chuter, a former Leicester player, He advised him to face a radical transformation and go from being an opening to the second line.
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“Chuter calls me one day and tells me that he has an opening of two meters that he wants to play second row and wants to have an experience in Argentina to learn from the good Argentine forwards,” he told THE NATION the Toro Ayerza, a Leicester Tigers legend. “There I just called him, I met Thibaud at a Costa Coffee in Oadby, the neighborhood where the Leicester training center is located, and we organized his visit. Here he lived in the Capital and worked at the French Embassy. In Argentina he played very well and made many friends ”.
Ayerza went to receive him at Ezeiza on a Saturday at 6 in the morning. He was his only contact in Argentina. He took him to the club and spent the whole day watching rugby, from youth to first division. He did not even know where he was going to sleep, a situation that was resolved in the roast of the third half.
Miguel Urtubey, one of the leaders of that teamHe remembers his time at the club: “When he arrived that afternoon we were playing against Regatas Bella Vista and he came to see us. He had no place to sleep and we did not know where to locate him. He spent a few days at Bisbal’s and later he got a room in San Isidro. I remember not going in because the ceiling was too low. He had different skills, but he was skinny. He lacked aggressiveness in contacts. He began to improve, he began to train and ended up being an animal. When he left we said ‘This kid is going to end up playing the World Cup in France 2023 ′. It was a different. He was the hardest to train, it was a headache to train against him. Always in a good mood, in a good mood, collaborating, helping. A phenomenon, great person. The family even came to see him play. He deserves everything he has ”.
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His time at Newman was brief but pivotal in his career. It came as a 90kg start and in one season managed to metamorphose into a second row that today marks 116 on the scale. “I chose Argentina because I already knew a little Spanish and because of rugby,” he said in an interview with L’Equipe. He began playing in the lower divisions and climbed to the first, to the point that ended up playing the final of the National Clubs that they lost to Hindú at the Vélez stadium, as a preliminary to the match between Jaguares and Stormers from Super Rugby. “I wanted to play well and it put a lot of pressure on me. At first, I would withdraw into myself, wearing headphones as I had seen on television that they did in England and France. I was getting into a zone of irritation where I was not comfortable, it was not healthy. I decided to change that when I experienced the warmth of the Argentines ”.
An interview as a Newman player
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According to L’Equipe’s chronicle, Thibaud cried when recounting the Argentine experience. “The strength of the motivational talks before the games, the boiling of the locker room when listening to the encouragement of the substitutes before going out to play, the look of the boys at the side of the court …”
Completed his “education” as a second line, turned 21, he faced the adventure towards professionalism. As the first step, he did not choose his native France, but to return to England. He returned to Longborough with the words of his coach at Newman in mind: “When you’re on the plane back, remember us as your family. You are part of Newman and you will always be welcome. “ After a few months in the first team of the University, with the intermediation of Ayerza he fell to Wasps, of the Premiership league. Within two months of joining the Coventry team, he was promoted to the first team and formed a pair in the second row with England international Joe Launchbury.
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In England he dazzled both with his furious tackle and his ductility for sleight of hand. He once gave a pass to the opening between the legs. “Some of the coaches told me not to do it again. Others congratulated me ”.
In mid-2020 he signed with the mighty Toulouse of the French Top 14 and for the first time lived in his native country. He was champion of France and Europe and won the call of Galthié. Caprices of destiny, the debut will be against Argentina, the country that formed it as a second line, and also as a person.
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