Aurelien Azar

He played his first top-flight match at twenty-eight, after three divisions and six years in the amateur and second tiers.

Aurélien Azar played his first match in the top division at 28. He had spent the previous six years in the third tier and the second.

Note on his current club: Azar is still listed in Castres‘s squad data. He joined Provence Rugby in Pro D2 in 2026.

Tighthead prop, 1.88m and 126kg, born in Courcouronnes on 10 June 1994 and raised at Arvillard in Savoie.

He started at US Montmélian and finished his training at Grenoble. In 2016 he signed for Michel Ringeval’s Chambéry in Fédérale 1 and played the 2017 final against Nevers, the match that decided promotion to Pro D2. Jérôme Rey, now a prop at Lyon, came through the same Chambéry side.

Carcassonne took him to Pro D2 in 2019 on two years and extended him to 2023 within months. He became the first-choice tighthead almost at once. In 2021-22 he played 28 matches, started 20 and scored four tries, and Carcassonne finished fifth to reach the play-offs for the first time in the club’s history. He started that match. They lost 24-12 to Nevers.

Castres, who had just been beaten in the Top 14 final, signed him on two years. His debut came on 3 September 2022 against Racing 92, on in the second half for Wilfried Hounkpatin.

That November the French Barbarians named him in a 23-man squad to face Fiji at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy. He extended for two more seasons during 2023-24.

A very heavy tighthead who took the slow road: amateur rugby at 22, the second division at 25, the first at 28, and four seasons in it before dropping back down. Props are the one position where that timeline is normal rather than a warning.