By STEVE MASCORD
AS the gates swing open on a sprawling vineyard, the fine light peculiar to southern France illuminates a tree-lined, evocative private road leading to Remi Casty’s 200-year-old farmhouse.
Actually, that’s horse crap. I met the Catalans Dragons captain in Huddersfield. But I thought it would make a nice intro to this story.
I remember interviewing Casty, now 33, when he was at Sydney Roosters in 2014. His team-mates pointed and laughed – the Frenchy is doing his first interview! It struck me as a peculiarly Australian attitude – surprise that the someone would find the most interesting member of the squad to be … the most interesting member of the squad.
Casty’s English is a lot better now, having finished his stint at Bondi Junction early so he could return to Catalans in 2015. They’ve not had the best start to the year; there’s plenty to ask about, from the state of the game in France to distilling exactly what the club’s culture is and what – if anything – is wrong with it.
Remi missed the World Cup due to a broken hand and that means he’s had a full pre-season, always cited by players as a major positive.
But, he says, “it was hard for me to look at the (France) boys in this campaign because I should have been there and against Australia and England, they tried to do their best and they competed very well but we’ve got a lot of injuries in our team.
“Ten good players missed the campaign. It was a young team. It will be good for them in four years at the next World Cup.
“But it was not a good campaign.”
The French didn’t just miss their captain on the pitch. One player, Hakim Miloudi, was kicked out of the squad before it left France and another, Eloi Pellisier, was sent home for breaking curfew during the tournament.
“When some players are doing the wrong thing, you have to make these decisions,” he says, shaking his head a little.
“You are wearing the French jersey. You are have to represent it. Before the beginning of the campaign, when something like that happens … now all the players know their focus has to be only on the pitch, to win the first game.”
How can the French game improve, then?
“It will be good for us to have another team in Super League,” Remy answers swiftly.
“…for the depth of the squad of France. There are some good players coming through. The more of them who are playing in Super League, the more we are a chance to compete in international games.
“Last year, the junior team beat England. We have such good players. We have to help them to be Super League players.”
Over there years I can remember many instances of such players starring as kids and then going to rugby union (sorry to swear). Is this still happening, I ask.
“Now, because of Catalans Dragons, because of Toulouse, we can keep them in rugby league. The last 10 years, we lost a lot of good young players to rugby union.”
OK, onto club rugby league. The 2017 Million Pound Game. Talk to us about it. Casty’s eyes go skywards and he mimics mopping his brow.
“It was very stressful,” he says. “Stressful for me, for my family, for everyone. It’s like a nightmare, you know, what can happen.
“If you lose, you go down. You don’t know if you will lose your contract and everything. It’s not good for players.”
But Casty is convinced Catalans would have remained a fulltime club, with Bernard Gausch at the helm, had they ended up in the championship.
“I know he would stay. He would have tried to come back to Super League. But it would have been a big impact for French rugby league, I think if we had been relegated.”
Now to the other Roosters – the Sydney Roosters.
“There is pride,” he says of his year at the club. “For a French player, it’s a dream to play for the Roosters, who won the year before I went there.
“It was unbelieveable for one year. Everything – training, games, all the fans, all the media, everything around rugby league (there) is top class.
“One week ago, I talked to (coach Trent Robinson). He’s a very good guy. He helped me to pass a big step in my career. When he arrived in Perpignan, I stepped up my level and he is my mentor, the guy who helped me to be a good player.”
In return, Remy helps Robbo with a bit of reconnaissance from time to time.
“He asks me, ‘this player, what is he like’,” Casty reveals. “It could be an English player, because he can’t watch every game.
“But they have a lot of good young players in Australia, ha.”
Few French players have made it in Oz. I ask Remy what he would tell a team-mate considering the move.
“I tell them ‘go’ and work hard,” he answers, “because it is hard. You are 24 hours from your family. If you want to see them, it’s impossible until the end of the season.
“Believe in yourself. If you’re doing the right thing and you’re working very hard, you can make it.
“I had my wife with me. For a young player, alone in Australia, it would be harder.”
One more thing. And as I ask the question, Casty smiles and nods knowingly. Do fans in Perpignan want Catalans to play a certain style and how do you balance this with the need to get a few Ws along the way?
“It’s true – France is like that,” he responds. “
“They want you to play every play. They don’t understand. They want us every time to offload and pass to the winger and all that.
“It’s impossible to win each game with this type of play. Sometimes you might have a game against a team and you do this and you win.
“But it’s maybe one game out of 10. You have to be stricter if you want to win something at the end of the season. You have to have good defence and put pressure on the opposition.”
And thus ends this interview conducted as we both stand in a tub of grapes in the sunshine, crushing thousands of them with each sentence.
