Mathis Sarragallet

Mathis Sarragallet lost three consecutive Pro D2 finals with Grenoble, in 2023, 2024 and 2025, and the three promotion play-offs that followed them. Two of those play-offs were lost with three minutes left, one by two points and one by three. Irakli Aptsiauri was in the same side for the first two seasons of it.

He is a hooker at Lyon, 1.78m and 109kg, born in Voiron on 6 July 2000.

He started at SO Voiron and played there from 2007 to 2015, then joined Grenoble, winning the Crabos championship with them in 2018 by beating Castres 20-13.

His professional debut came in September 2020, at twenty, for the club that developed him. He has stayed a hooker throughout, which at 1.78m makes him a low, compact scrummager rather than a ball-carrying one.

He came off the bench in the 2023 final, lost 14-3 to Oyonnax, and in the play-off defeat to Perpignan that followed. He was a replacement again in 2024, beaten 16-9 by Vannes, and in the play-off Grenoble lost 18-20 to Montpellier.

The last season was the closest. Grenoble topped the regular table, beat Provence 38-17 in the home semi-final, and lost the final 24-19 to Montauban. The play-off against Perpignan on 14 June 2025 went 11-13.

Lyon recruited him at the end of it.

A short, thickset hooker who has never played top-flight rugby and has played more high-pressure knockout matches than most players who have. Six of them, all lost, is a strange preparation for a Top 14 debut, and not necessarily a bad one.