Catalans Dragons : Still The Result Of A Merger In 2000
Catalans Dragons (or Dracs Catalans in Catalan) is a club of French rugby league founded in 2005 and based in Perpignan. They move into Super League, the latter is composed of twelve clubs in England, a Welsh club and the Dragons are the only French representative. The president Bernard Guasch Dragons is the first team is coached by Kevin Walters from 2009. The club began the 2009 season with a budget of 6 million euros and has surpassed the number of 5000 subscribers.
The Catalans Dragons are the result of a merger in 2000 between two leading French clubs: the XIII Catalan (founded 1934) and AS Saint-Esteve (founded 1965). In 2000, the club is called Catalan Lunion treizistes before taking the name of the Catalan Dragons in 2005 when it was integrated in the Super League during the 2006 season, it however keeps a team in the league of France under the name of Union treizistes Catalan.
Sole representative in the French league with a franchise system, the Dragons were able to quickly become a contender for top spots. Its highlights include a Challenge Cup final lost in 2007 to 84.000 spectators, two appearances in the finals during the 2008 season after a third place regular season and in 2009 when the Dragons bowed semi-final against Leeds Rhinos .
In July 2000, while the fifth season of the rugby league’s most prestigious North lhemisphere sensation across the Channel, Bernard Guasch businessmen and former treiziste, contributes significantly to the creation of Lunion treizistes Catalan born of the merger between the XIII Catalan and St Esteve Sll XIII.
Finding himself at the head of the club’s management, Bernard Guasch is not a single shareholder or a wealthy investor, is an avid rugby league and especially in the Roussillon. By combining two of the biggest winners of the French rugby league, the former playmaker XIII Catalan and St Esteve XIII Sll, has created the biggest club in the Pyrenees-Orientales, even France.
This merger allows the club to present a showcase of no less than 17 championship trophies in France Elite 1 and 16 sections of France.
The ultimate goal of Bernard Guasch is to get his club in the biggest European Championship: the Super League. He wants to be the second French club to integrate this championship, after the Paris Saint-Germain XIII who played in this competition for two seasons between 1996 and 1997.
Thrown into the deep end of the Super League in 2006, the Dragons played their first game February 11, 2006 at the Stade Aime Giral against Wigan Warriors with a victory in the key (38-30), but the New Zealander injured Stacey Jones (broken arm) seriously hampers their first year despite its replacement by the young Australian Michael Dobson (19), since the end of the regular season, the Dragons are the twelfth and final spot for a record of eight wins and twenty losses Sixteen points in total to three lengths of Castleford Tigers. However, they are protected during their first three years of exile.
Crowned with this performance in the Challenge Cup, leave the Dragons in 2008 with big ambitions in the league. It is not denied as the club finished the year third in the regular season behind St Helens and Leeds Rhinos which allows him to take part in the play-offs at the end of the season. On September 13, the Dragons beat Warrington Wolves 46-8 in their first game of the playoffs but were then bea
ten in the race for the finals by Wigan Warriors 26-50 in Perpignan on September 20. In Challenge Cup, the club was eliminated in the knockout stage-finals by Bradford Bulls.
At year end, coach Mike Potter is nominated Coach of the Year in the Super League, but left his post to join St Helens and was replaced by his compatriot Kevin Walters.
For their fourth season in Super League, Catalans Dragons qualify again for the final rounds. Despite a difficult season, they catch the eighth. Once in the finals, the Dragons managed to fight off Wakefield Trinity Wildcats and Huddersfield Giants before being eliminated in the semi-finals by the eventual winners Leeds Rhinos. In FA Cup, free eliminates the Bradford Bulls in the sixteenth-finals but were beaten in the next round by St Helens RLFC.
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