Jérôme SCHUSTER

Biog of Jérôme SCHUSTER :

Jérôme Schuster was one of the surprise selections in Marc Lièvremont's squad for the November 2010 tests, although forwards coach Didier Retière had been pushing his case over the last two years since a particular match against Racing where Schuster, on the right side of the Catalan scrum, had caused all sorts of trouble for his opposite number. Although Schuster went on tour with France A to play in the Churchill Cup in June 2010, the 25-year-old is not yet number one for his club, Perpignan. Able to play on the left or right of the scrum, although more of a loose-head than a tight-head prop, he has grown up at his club in the shadows of Perry Freshwater, and his cousin Nicolas Mas, appearing regularly for the first team since the 2008-2009 season, although he did not play in that year's Top 14 final victory against Clermont. He made up for it in June though in the repeat of the previous year's final, coming on as a replacement for Perry Freshwater in the 63rd minute - although ending up on the losing side.

Jérôme Schuster, a native of Catalonia like a good number of his teammates at USAP, joined the famous “Blood and Golds” in 2002 after a period with Côte Vermeille. He was late to discover rugby, preferring football until he was fifteen years old. “I enjoyed the commitment and the contact straight away,” he explains. “In rugby, when you bang into an opponent he doesn't make a meal of it. At the beginning I played all over the place - number eight, hooker... But given my size I couldn't really expect to play anywhere else but prop.”* Schuster is a big man, measuring 1.81m for 117 kilos, but he can run as well and it was this aspect of his game - being as present in the open as he is in the tight - that seduced the Tricolores staff - to his great astonishment. “I’m as surprised as anyone by the progress I've made,” he revealed at Marcoussis. “It's been incredible. I put it down to the USAP coaches’ confidence in me and to the game-time I've had. When you feel at ease you can relax and play a bit more.” He was given his chance for France straightaway, appearing in the starting line-up in the match against Fiji and then as replacement against Australia (coming on in the 51st minute for Domingo). Lièvremont declares himself happy with his discovery’s two performances to date. With the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand in mind, Schuster finds himself in direct competition with the two old warriors Jean-Baptiste Poux and Sylvain Marconnet for the role of polyvalent tight-head/loose-head prop.

* L’Equipe, 10 November 2010