Union Bordeaux-Bègles have named Matthieu Jalibert and Louis Bielle-Biarrey in their starting XV for Saturday afternoon’s Champions Cup final against Leinster in Bilbao. The Girondins will go into the match with Maxime Lucu and Jalibert at half-back, while Damian Penaud and Yoram Moefana are paired in the centre.
Salesi Rayasi starts at fullback, with Pablo Uberti on one wing and Bielle-Biarrey on the other. Pierre Bochaton is in the back row alongside Cameron Woki and Marko Gazzotti, while Carlu Sadie wears number 3 between Maxime Lamothe and Jefferson Poirot in the front row. The full Bordeaux starting side is Rayasi, Uberti, Penaud, Moefana, Bielle-Biarrey, Jalibert, Lucu, Woki, Gazzotti, Bochaton, Coleman, Palu, Sadie, Lamothe and Poirot.
The match marks Bordeaux’s second straight Champions Cup final after their 2025 title win over Northampton, and they arrive in Bilbao with a line-up that keeps faith with the core that took them to the top of Europe. Ben Tameifuna begins on the bench, where he is listed among the eight replacements after being used as a supersub in earlier rounds. That leaves Bordeaux with power in reserve, but also puts the spotlight on the starting pack named on Friday for a final they cannot afford to start slowly.
Leinster, meanwhile, have named their own full-strength side, with Hugo Keenan at fullback, Garry Ringrose and Robbie Henshaw in midfield, Jamison Gibson-Park at scrum-half and Caelan Doris in the back row. The Irish club’s XV underlines the scale of the task facing Bordeaux in Spain, where the French side will try to turn last year’s breakthrough into a repeat triumph. Rugbyrama summed up the selection with a blunt line: “Jalibert et ‘LBB’ bien évidemment là, Bochaton flanker.”
For Bordeaux, the question is no longer whether they belong on this stage. It is whether a team that learned how to win a European final in 2025 can do it again, away from home, against one of the competition’s most complete sides.
