I am starting a series of posts about my favorite team : Le Stade Francais

By a strange shortcut in history, it happens that the club which todays leads the French profesionnal league (champion in 2003 and 2004) was also one of the leading teams in the nascent (amateur) championship at the end of the 19th century... During the first 15 years of competition, Stade Francais managed 13 times to be finalist, and won 6 titles in total...

More than that, his founders and fist players (H.Amand, L.and J.Dedet, P.Vauresmont, E.St Chaffray, M.Communeau and many others) played a key role in establishing the Game in France, structuring clubs and championships, and eventually founding a French national team able to compete with England, Wales, New Zealand etc...

I started collecting rugby stuff something like 2 years ago just after my wife offered me a nice book despicting the early days of Stade Francais rugby team...

I like this print very much, but I must admit it is a modern copy ! In fact, I dont know where is the original and I dont know who I should credit for it... It shows the main Parisian rivals of late 1890s and early 1900s : Stade Francais and Racing Club de France.

Honestly, I dont know the date nor the place of this match. It could be Bagatelle (in the Bois de Boulogne, where I have played many times on saturdays with my folks...)in 1892 for the very first final lost 3-4 to the RCF (in that case, you'll be happy to know that the referee with the nice hat must be Pierre de Coubertin, who cared about Rugby before caring about Olympic Games)... or it could be the 1893 championship final in Asnieres (near Paris) this time won 7-3 by Stade Francais... First of a serie of 3 titles in a row : 1893, 1894, 1895...