Toulon to let former French international's contract expire

Toulon are set to let former French international turned coach Julien Dupuy depart the club.

Toulon will not be renewing his current contract as backs coach, bringing to end a two season spell at the big spending French side. Dupuy will depart at the end of June L'Equipe report.

Toulon are turning over a new leaf next season with a dual coaching ticket of current Lyon head coach Pierre Mignoni and current Toulon head coach Frank Azéma.

The club apparently feel that the Mignoni-Azéma axis will be more than enough to cover attack and the back division.

Toulon are also awaiting the arrival of Matthieu Bastareaud to the club, who is also leaving Lyon. The centre cum No.8 is retiring from playing but is set to take charge of Toulon's U18 Crabos team.

The former heavyweights had a dreadful first half to the season but have successfully turned around their fortunes in 2022, going from second from bottom at one stage to respectable seventh.

They also reached the final of the Challenge Cup, where they were well beaten - somewhat ironically - by Mignoni's Lyon.

Lyon claimed the first European trophy in their history with a 30-12 victory over Toulon in the final of the Challenge Cup at Stade Velodrome in front of a record crowd of 51,431 in Marseille.