Max Guazzini

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Max Guazzini is the current president of the the Stade Français rugby union club of Paris, who compete in the top division of rugby union in France, the Top 14. Since arriving at Stade Français in the early 1990s, the club has risen from the lower divisions of competition to become one of the mose successful French rugby teams of the modern era. In 1982, he was the founder of a successful private music radio station called NRJ, until he abandoned his seat as board member in 2004.

Guazzini aspired to bring back top-class rugby to the city of Paris, and in 1992 he took over Stade Français, who had been playing in the lower divisions of competition. The club was in the third division when he took over in 1992. He would later say “I want to build a club for Paris, for the people, of which it can be proud”[1]. Together with his backing, the club merged with another Parsian team, the Comitie Athletic St Germain (CASG) in 1995, and with then head-coach Bernard Laporte (later, becoming the head coach of France) they rose rapidly up into the elite division of French rugby. By 1998 they had won the French championship, and completed a dramatic rise to glory in such a short period of time.

Guazzini scheduled a home fixture in 2005 against Stade Toulousain at the national stadium, Stade de France. The final attendance was 79,502, smashing the national attendance record for a league match in any sport by more than 20,000. Moments before the end of the match, Guazzini announced to the crowd that another fixture scheduled against Biarritz in March in 2006 would also be held at the stadium. The Stade-Biarritz match broke the attendance record from earlier in the season, with 79,604 attending.

The 2006-07 Top 14 season has so far been a smashing success on the field. Stade won their first nine matches, and after 15 rounds have a 9-point lead[1] on their nearest competition. Also, with the success of the two Stade de France fixtures in 2005-06, Guazzini booked the venue for the home fixtures against Biarritz and Toulouse in the 2006-07 season. He also booked Parc des Princes for Stade's Heineken Cup home fixture against Sale Sharks. The first of these fixtures to be played, the return match with Biarritz, set yet another record for a French league match, with an official attendance of 79,619.

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ In most domestic rugby leagues, including the French league, the winner earns four points, with the possibility of a bonus point for scoring four or more tries. Stade's current lead is roughly a two-match lead.

[edit] External links

Languages