Juan Ignacio Brex ‘absolutely stunned’ the Stormers didn’t do the ‘obvious’ and expects ‘something special’ from Franco Smith
RC Toulon centre Juan Ignacio Brex celebrates after the Champions Cup win over the Stormers. (INPHO/Federico Pestellini/EPCR)
RC Toulon’s Italian vice-captain Juan Ignacio Brex on Saturday’s Stormers epic, the Glasgow Warriors’ challenge, and leading through silence.
There is a moment in every great Investec Champions Cup tie when the mathematics of defence reduces to something primal. Fourteen men. Thirteen men. A wall of black jerseys on the Toulon tryline. The clock red. The Stormers driving, driving, driving. And in the middle of it all, Juan Ignacio Brex, Toulon’s star signing and one of the most physical centres in European rugby, was doing something remarkable. He was waiting for the ball to go wide but hoping it wouldn’t.
It was the obvious thing to do
“I was waiting for them to play wide in the last five, ten minutes when we were down to thirteen,” Brex told Planet Rugby exclusively, speaking from Toulon ahead of Saturday’s Investec Champions Cup quarter-final against Glasgow Warriors at Scotstoun.
“We were down to one centre, but it was obviously more dangerous because we only had one guy in defence behind us, so four on two all the time, if you like. So I was waiting for them to play wide, but they didn’t do it. So that’s okay for our forwards, I thought, as we had real quality there and I know how good our ruck defence is.
“I was absolutely stunned they didn’t try to go around us as it was the obvious thing to do,” Brex questioned.
It is a statement that reveals everything about the Azzurri vice-captain as a rugby player. Where others would celebrate the survival, the 28-27 victory over the Stormers at a heaving Stade Mayol last Saturday, the Argentine-born Italian international is quietly dissecting the opposition’s failure to exploit the space his side had conceded.
He knows Toulon were fortunate. He knows the Stormers should have gone wide. And he knows that Glasgow, who await this Saturday, will not make the same mistake.
Toulon’s round of 16 victory was 80 minutes of controlled chaos. In 27-degree heat, with the whole city packed into a stadium that sits in the middle of its streets, Pierre Mignoni’s side survived a Stormers onslaught that saw Marcel Theunissen’s last-gasp effort denied by the TMO for inconclusive grounding. Charles Ollivon held up a driving maul on his own tryline with brilliant execution and no less knowledge of the Laws of the Game.
Ma’a Nonu, 43 years old, was yellow-carded for head contact with two minutes remaining. And through it all, Brex was at the defensive heart, making two tries for his backline and producing a performance that earned him a place in Planet Rugby’s Team of the Week.
The defensive communication in those final minutes, Brex explains, was brutally simple. “It was to try to get numbers down on the ruck – defend where the ball is. That’s the simple point. We focused on getting people down on the breakdown with only one man on the outside, because they had to play. They had to score. So we try to have a good first line on defence and hit hard, and that’s it. Just our jobs. And it worked.”
Focus fully on the Investec Champions Cup
Sergio Parisse had told Planet Rugby before the game that Europe was everything now for RCT. The club legend, in his final continental campaign before moving into a forwards coaching role with Italy, had essentially written off the TOP 14, and the numbers support his logic. Toulon sit 11th domestically, five matches without a league win, beaten 36-20 at Perpignan a week before the Stormers arrived. Yet the same group of players who have sleepwalked through the French league produced something close to magnificent when the Mayol demanded it.
Brex acknowledged the contradiction: “It was not enough what we are doing in the last few games in the TOP 14. So, we had to improve, everyone from the first player to the fifteenth – or fourteenth! I think we did it as a team. But obviously, it’s not finished and we still have chances to go further.”
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Glasgow Warriors, who finished second in the pool stage and sit top of the United Rugby Championship, will host their first-ever Champions Cup quarter-final at Scotstoun on Saturday. Franco Smith’s side ground out a 25-21 win over the Bulls last weekend, and their European trajectory under the South African has been steep across three seasons. They are unbeaten in this year’s competition. The artificial pitch, the pace of the surface, Glasgow’s ferocity over the ball, the noise of a sold-out Scotstoun: all of it represents a challenge with no resemblance whatsoever to last Saturday in the south of France.
Brex is acutely aware of the threat. “Glasgow are first in the URC. They were one of the best teams in the pool stage of the Champions Cup. We need to be aware everywhere. That’s the main point. We cannot stop thinking for even one second, because if you stop for one second in your mind, they will score, they are really that good. Attack, defence, they are good. So, for us, it’s a big, big challenge.”
There is a specific tactical dimension that concerns Toulon’s midfield general. Glasgow, under Franco Smith, play a high-tempo, transition-heavy game built on rapid work at the ruck and the kind of short kicks from nine that Brex has studied closely.
“They like to play fast. That’s the main point. And they used to use a lot of the short kicks off nine, these kind of things, over or short. I know Franco well and I know they’ll like to surprise us. So, we need to be attentive because Franco can come up with something special that we haven’t seen before.”
The artificial surface at Scotstoun adds another layer. “Yes, the 4G! It’s faster than normal. And they like to play fast. The physical part will probably be the main point, but you have to adjust for the extra pace of the surface,” Brex conceded.
Six Nations edge?
And then there is the Scottish dimension that only Brex and his fellow Azzurri can truly understand. In February, Italy beat Scotland 18-15 in Rome in the Six Nations opener, a result that sent shockwaves through the tournament and heaped pressure on Gregor Townsend.
It was a match in which Brex won his 50th Italian cap, set up Louis Lynagh’s opening try with a precise grubber through the defensive line, and then watched his teammates repel 29 Scottish phases in the dying minutes to seal the victory. Several of the Glasgow players who will face Toulon on Saturday were on the wrong end of that result: Jack Dempsey scored Scotland’s first try, Kyle Steyn started on the wing, Max Williamson was prominent in the pack, and George Horne (under a fitness cloud for the quarter-final) came off the bench to score a late consolation.
Does that Six Nations intelligence give Toulon an edge? Brex is characteristically measured. “We know them, and a lot of our international players know them for their various countries. I think Glasgow are an amazing team and their DNA is similar to Scotland itself. They have a brilliant attack, so fast and skillful. They have a good defence. So, we need to be aware of many different types of threats with varied points of attack, but all at high tempo, their hallmark. Ruck speed is key; we have taller forwards, so the contact area is critical and we will have to be really precise in terms of body heights and so on.”
Edinburgh beat Toulon 33-20 at Hive Stadium in the pool stage back in December, and the memory of that result lingers as Toulon prepare to travel north once more. The challenge is clear: can a side that has explicitly prioritised Europe over the Top 14 sustain the emotional intensity of last Saturday’s Mayol epic in the altogether different atmosphere of Scotstoun? On his own leadership, Brex draws a fascinating distinction between his role with Italy, where he is a senior voice, and his position at Toulon, where he remains the newer arrival navigating a dressing room of established figures.
“In Italy, people trust me. People know me very well. But I don’t talk all the time. I try to talk in the moments that I think are necessary. Here at Toulon, it’s more difficult. I’m the new one. If I have to talk, I do it. But there are a lot of people who have been here five years, ten years. So I prefer at the beginning to respect my colleagues.”
Charles Ollivon
It is a revealing answer from a player whom Italy’s coaching staff regard as an exceptional cultural leader, and one that speaks to the intelligence of his approach. Brex does not demand the floor. He earns it. And when he speaks, people listen.
Asked about Ollivon, whose last-ditch tackle on the Stormers’ final drive was among the great individual defensive moments in recent Champions Cup history, Brex is effusive. “Our captain is incredible. He’s a very positive guy, always with a smile, trying to bring the team to the best shape possible, even mentally. He’s a very positive leader, and he respects everyone. Everyone respects him, and on the field, he does everything he can to show that he’s the leader. Charles is very important to us. Physical, but even very intelligent and that moment just sums up how knowledgeable he is regarding the laws and legality of the in-goal situation. It was a clutch play of the highest order, and we will need all of that sort of experience in Glasgow too, I assure you.”
The road to Bilbao runs through Scotstoun on Saturday. If Toulon prevail, they face either Leinster Rugby or Sale Sharks in the semi-finals, with the final at San Mamés Stadium on 23 May. For Brex, for Ollivon, and for Parisse in what may be his last European campaign, the stakes could not be higher. “It’s not finished,” Brex says again, quietly.
And somewhere in his preparation this week, you suspect, there is a note about Glasgow’s outside backs, about the speed of their transitions, about the width that the Stormers never found. And you can be sure Brex will not be caught waiting twice.
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