It is one of the leading clubs in the region and in the world of ovality. Today chaired by Jean-Louis Prat and Patrick Craighero, it claims deep roots with the creation of the Rougien Cross Sports Club in 1919.
It was after the Second World War that the club played the leading roles at the regional level. But following incidents during a rather “hot” match in 1954, against La Monnaie de Paris, a referee who ended up in La Mogne and a few scuffles, the club was expelled.
Dark period, and it took more than fifteen years for it to reappear in 1971 thanks to a handful of oval ball enthusiasts, Jean-Pierre Boy, (who gave his name to the gymnasium), Gerard Mathelin and Mr. Rey.
It is also thanks to these three men that the first rugby school, which is still the pride of the club today, was born within the Amicale laïque.
The club really took off in 1975, with the creation of the Entente Sportif de Saint-Martin-d’Hères (ESSM) rugby and a senior team which gradually rose through the ranks, moving to the third series at the end of the 1978 season. .
But the objective of Jean-Pierre Boy and Gerard Mathelin is to grow the club, with the association with the ASPTT rugby, a merger, which creates an excellent atmosphere and the constant concern for the training of young people, with the perspective a better level for the flag team, the driving force of the whole club. We are in 1981.
The World Cup on a giant screen
From 2012, the club took the necessary steps to change its name in order to gain visibility. After validation by the FFR steering committee, the club will be called Saint-Martin-d’Hères rugby, and last step, in June 2020, the GUC and SMH rugby will form only one club: the RAS GUC-SMH rugby with a three-headed presidency, Jean-Louis Prat and Patrick Craighero for SMH and Sami Djedidi for the GUC.
But the GUC-SMH rugby is also Touch rugby, with the Martineroise team, SMH Blues Rouch (currently in the European Cup in Vichy until August 12); rugby, and of course the beautiful school of rugby, from the first steps to the youngest as well as all categories of youth teams.
At the start of the 2023-2024 season, the club is organizing Friday, September 8 from 7 p.m., the broadcast on a giant screen at the Robert-Barran stadium, of the opening match of the Rugby World Cup, the shock XV of France – All Blacks at the Stade de France.
Bar and restaurant on site. For the youngest inflatable structures.
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