Rude awaking for returning Pau
They were soundly beaten 34-18 by champions Stade Francais in their first match back among the elite.
Stade – for whom young flyhalf Jules Plisson kicked 14 points – ran in four tries to Pau's two, but the visitors will be hoping for a much better performance next time out as their indiscipline let them down badly.
Four of their players were sin-binned during the game – including two of their star signings in the close season, Fijian Mosese Ratuvou and Sean Dougall.
They will also hope they limit the damage in the coming weeks as they have to wait to welcome Conrad Smith and Colin Slade, who should be on World Cup duty with the defending champion the All Blacks.
For Stade it was the perfect way to alert their title rivals such as Clermont, Toulouse, three-time European champions Toulon and Racing-Metro, that they will not let their crown slip easily.
The newly-promoted side had got off the mark first through a penalty by Samuel Marques but an error by their battle-hardened former France international Damien Traille allowed the champions to storm back.
Traille opted to run the ball than kick it clear but the 36-year-old lost the ball and it ultimately ended with the ball coming to Australian lock Hugh Pyle who burrowed over from a few metres out.
Plisson – who but for a shoulder injury at the end of last season would have been in contention for a place in the France World Cup squad – converted for 7-3 after five minutes.
Marques reduced the deficit to a point before Plisson added two more penalties to give the posts a 13-6 lead after 15 minutes.
Stade easily held Pau at bay, even when they lost influential centre Jonathan Danty through injury a minute into the second-half they conjured up a try minutes later through flanker Antoine Burban – Plisson missing the touchline conversion.
Pau, though, hit back with Thierry Lacrampe going over for their first try, the replacement scrum-half going over after an off-load from Dougall, who managed to get the ball away despite an excellent tackle by Burban.
Santiago Fernandez converted for 18-13.
However, Dougall, who joined from Munster in the close season, then did his side a huge disservice in attracting the ire of the referee Salem Attalah and it resulted in him being yellow-carded and Plisson landing the resulting penalty to make it 21-13.
Pau's fortunes dipped further two minutes later as Ratuvou was somewhat unjustly sin-binned for what Attalah deemed a deliberate knock-on when it could have been interpreted as an effort to intercept the pass – Plisson converted the penalty for 24-13.
They were punished further as flanker Raphael Lakafia rounded off a superb passing move by the hosts – Plisson missing the conversion to leave the score 29-13.
The visitors stuck to their task of trying to at least obtain a defensive bonus point and Daniel Ramsay gave them hope as he crashed through two tackles to touch down with 12 minutes remaining on the clock – Fernandez failed to convert.
There was just time for fullback Djibril Camara to add a fourth try to round off an impressive opening win.
Top 14 results:
Stade Francais 34 Pau 18
La Rochelle 6 Clermont 44
Bordeaux-Begles 19 Castres 16
Toulouse 24 Brive 7
Montpellier 35 Oyonnax 19
Grenoble 38 Agen 23
Toulon 22 Racing-Metro 27
Agence France-Presse
