The fight to climb out of Federale 1 into the professional leagues is the toughest in the French game. As the lower-league season kicks off, we examine the 40 runners and riders, pick our winners and losers and take a wild stab at who'll be playing in Pro D2 this time next year

A full month after the big boys kicked off the Top 14 season, France's Federale leagues enter the fray this weekend, with 280 clubs in action across the French Rugby Federation's newly streamlined three semi-pro divisions.

Down from a 367-team competition last year, the Federale leagues now consist of 28 10-team divisions across three tiers. It's at the top level - Federale 1 - where the reward is greatest, with the two play-off finalists stepping up to the professional Pro D2 level. To get there, they'll have to finish in the top four in their pool and battle their way through three play-off rounds.

All four pools are broadly geographical to minimise travel costs. All teams play each other home and away, with the top four in each pool progressing to a 16-team knockout round. Knockout ties will be played home and away until the neutrally hosted final, a largely inconsequential affair as the winners of the semi-finals will still be nursing promotion hangovers. At the other end of each pool, the bottom two in each group drop down to Federale 2.

The Pools

(* = promoted from Fed2, † = relegated from Pro D2)

Pool 1 - Nord-Paris

The teams: Bobigny, Boulogne-Billancourt*, Dijon, Lille, Macon, Massy, Montlucon, Nevers, Orleans, Strasbourg

Three Paris clubs are aiming to join their top-flight neighbours in the professional ranks, but Massy look the team most likely to progress after losing out on a Pro D2 place in the final seconds of their play-off semi-final against Perigueux in May. Bobigny should press them hard, as will Lille - back in the North-East group after a year criss-crossing France as part of the South-West pool (they reached the play-offs despite the best efforts of a vindictive league organisation who were forced to reinstate them in Fed1 by the French courts).

Nevers, backed by testile magnate and France's 241st richest man Régis Dumange, have the biggest budget in the pool at €3.3m and should perform better than last season when they struggled to find their Fed1 feet.

Dijon and Montlucon will be pushing for the play-offs too, while the third Parisian outfit Boulogne-Billancourt arrive from Fed2 and look set to struggle to maintain their third-division place. Strasbourg, Orleans and Macon struggled in this pool last year and look set to join the Parisians in a fight to avoid the drop.

Top: Massy, Nevers, Bobigny, Lille
Drop: Boulogne-Billancourt, Strasbourg

Pool 2 - Sud-Est

The teams: Bourg-en-Bresse, Castanet, Chateaurenard, La Seyne, Stade Phocéen*, Montauban, Nice, Nimes*, Romans, Saint-Etienne†

The Languedoc/Provence group of death saw one of its teams, Beziers, join Pro D2 last season, but the presence of recently professional trio Bourg-en-Bresse, Saint-Etienne and Montauban makes it a tough pool to get out of.

Provencal pretenders Nice look a good bet to challenge those three, while the group's wild card, Marseilles-based Stade Phocéen, return to Fed1 two years after making headlines by signing Jonah Lomu before being demoted to Fed2 for financial shennanigans. They responded in style, winning all 30 games of the 2010/11 season, scoring 1513 points in the process and conceding just 223. The gap between Feds 1 and 2 is huge, but that form should at least see them survive the drop, and may see them cause a few upsets on the way.

Romans and La Seyne should continue in their recent vein of mid-season mediocrity, while Toulouse-based Castanet turned a few heads by reaching the play-offs last season but will struggle to get that far this term.

Top: Montauban, Bourg-en-Bresse, Saint-Etienne, Nice
Drop: Nimes, Chateaurenard

Pool 3 - Grand Ouest

The teams: Colomiers†, Hagetmau*, Langon, Lavaur, Morlaas, St-Jean-de-Luz, Saint-Junien, Saint-Medard, Saint-Nazaire, Vannes

Colomiers won't be welcoming the opportunity to make Fed1 history by becoming the first team to win the divisional championship three times, but they are clear favourites to win this geographically disparate group, which stretches from the Breton town of Vannes all the way down to St-Jean-de-Luz, just a few kilometres from the Spanish border.

Of the 10, only Vannes and Lavaur reached the play-offs last season, making this the weakest of the four pools. Former Heineken Cup finalists Colomiers should walk this one, but the other three play-off spots could go to any three of the remaining eight, with Hagetmau dropping back down at the first time of asking.

Top: Colomiers, Vannes, Lavaur, St-Jean-de-Luz
Drop: Hagetmau, Saint-Junien

Pool 4 - Sud-Ouest

The teams: Blagnac, Lannemezan, Limoges, Lourdes, Mauleon, Marmande, Oloron, Riberac, Tyrosse, Valence d'Agen

In this, the toughest of the four pools, Tyrosse will be hoping to go one better after losing out to Beziers in their play-off semi-final last season and falling at the same hurdle the year before that. Limoges ran eventual Fed1 runners-up Perigueux close last season and are also in the running to return to Pro D2, while Lannemezan and Marmande are no strangers to the play-offs and Lourdes, Blagnac and Valence d'Agen can all mix it on their day.

Top: Tyrosse, Limoges, Lannemezan, Lourdes
Drop: Mauleon, Riberac

Our Federale 1 Verdict

That giants Beziers only escaped Federale 1 at the second attempt tells you all you need to know about this uncompromising division, but there are some clear candidates to reach Pro D2 come June. Colomiers will live up to their billing as the league's yoyo club, though fortunately for them their string is upwardly mobile this year.

We'd back Tyrosse to join them after two last-gasp disappointments, but don't rule out last season's surprise package Massy or big spenders Limoges. Bourg-en-Bresse and Montauban will fancy a run to the play-offs, and if you're looking at a good each-way bet, take Vannes or Nevers to be up there at season's end.