"Circumstances have made the victory even better"

The game

"I never lost confidence in our players. Honestly, the investment they have given since July 4 is amazing. But we started this season with a lot of injuries and a little confidence after the end of last season. I told our players before the game we needed to find the key to this team. For each team, there is a key, there is a moment when it rocks, the team gains confidence, a time when we understand that you have to play for each other. I had not imagined that the game goes like this. I had imagined a correct match, where we won the game. We won the game, not really in the game, but with the courage and sacrifice. This is good, this is the real rugby! We saw 23 guys who were ready to hurt themselves, to run, to press, and no one was hidden."

Circumstances

"I thought that victory would be the key. No matter how to win the game, if we win, it will really start things. I think the circumstances made the victory even better for that. Everything was against us: the consequences of the fight, the way the week went, when we lost Ben Hand, Sisa Waqa, Gio Aplon and Dayna Edwards. The guys were serious during the team's run. Players who were not on the teamsheet came to support the players before the game, at the initiative of Arnaud Héguy, Fabien Gengenbacher and Lucas Dupont. This may be the time when we found our togetherness."

The forwards

"We know that in the history of the FCG, there is a strong scrum, strong driving balls, a large pack of forwards, which does not go back. We also know that at the end of last season, our performances were not acceptable. We recruited Aaron Dundon who is very strong in these areas. And we made a lot of scrums, we worked on tactics and technique. But at the Stade Lesdiguières, we can only do scrum against ourselves. As you do a scrum in opposition, both teams do the same thing. We must wait for matches to test our strategy and adapt to the opponents because, the scrum of the LOU is different fromthe one of Stade Français, which is different from the scrum of Brive. Our motto is: "We win or we learn." During the three defeats, much has been learned. Remember that we also gave two more weeks to Rossouw de Klerk for him to do a great preparation, to stay with us for the long term. And he was huge tonight. It was also the same with Dayna Edwards, but he has got injured on Monday. Do not think just the start of the season, but think how there can be Dayna Edwards and Rossouw de Klerk in better shape and be able to play throughout the season. Rossouw de Klerk played his best game for us. I have great confidence in him, because he was a better prop right in Pro12. But he missed the preparation last season and he has never been physically fit, he was not good. His career with us has started today. Now with Walter Desmaison and Ali Oz, we have three available tighthead props we can trust. It corresponds to the work we do. Against the Stade Français and the LOU, the scrum was not good. But the matches are the best opportunity to learn."

The fans

"We must also congratulate our fans. They were huge! They gave us a lot of confidence. And I believe and I hope that this game will allow us to regain the trust of our fans. It is our fault that we lost it because we were not good. I hope that our supporters and partners have seen that even if we have injuries, if we have many unavalaible players for the backs, guys are proud to play for Grenoble."