6 December 2009: Racing climb to third, Brive upset Toulouse and Albi claim another scalp

Racing-Metro 28 Toulon 15; Brive 27 Toulouse 21; Albi 20 Biarritz 9 - Latest league table

Racing-Metro climbed to a new high of third in the Top 14 with a 28-15 victory over Toulon. It was Racing's eighth win in a row and the 13-point margin marked their most comfortable victory of the season and their highest score.

Francois Steyn scored the only try of the match midway through the second half. Sebastian Chabal won line-out ball on the Toulon 10 metre line, and fed to scrum-half Mathieu Lorée. Lorée found the gap, drew the last defender and passed to the South African centre, who scored his first try for his new club right under the posts.

Steyn also kicked two penalties for the Parisians, and Jonathan Wisniewski chipped in with 17 points, including a pair of drop goals early in the second half to break the 12-all half-time deadlock. Outside-half Wis has kicked five drops in his last three appearances for Racing, one behind opposite number Jonny Wilkinson, who lifted himself to the top of the points charts with five more penalties.

Racing's gain is Toulouse's loss, as the 16-times champions came back from an 18-3 deficit at Brive to tie the scores only to end up losing 27-21.

Former Toulouse star Nicolas Jeanjean was Brive's hero, the winger bagging two tries in the first seven minutes, the first being set up by a charge from Jamie Noon and the second, two minutes later, coming as David Skrela was tackled by Gerhard Vosloo and Jeanjean intercepted Skrela's pass to race home.

Fabrice Estebanez dropped two goals and Skrela struck two penalties to give Brive an 18-6 half-time lead, before a rampant Toulouse levelled the scores within 10 minutes of the interval. First Cedric Heymans followed up a Freddie Michalak up-and-under to score in the corner, and then on 50 minutes Michalak put up another high ball from the back of a struggling scrum for Heymans to take and put Florian Fritz over for the equalising score.

But Brive weren't beaten, and Alexis Palisson's first penalty on 58 minutes regained the lead before Estebanez's third drop goal gave the hosts a six-point cushion. Michalak struck back with a penalty a minute later, but Pelisson restored the two-kick gap and Brive's pack played out a tight last 10 minutes in Toulouse's half to hold on for a victory that takes them 10 points clear of the relegation zone.

That particular trap door is still occupied by Bayonne and Albi, although a second victory in three matches has pulled Albi to within four points of the beleaguered Basques.

Bayonne's neighbours Biarritz became the first team this season to leave Stade Municipal without so much as a point, losing 20-9 as Kevin Boulogne followed up his masterful performance against Perpignan to score the only try of the match and add three penalties.

There was an element of luck in the try, scrum-half Boulogne knocking the ball on when intercepting on the halfway line. But his transgression went unnoticed by the referee and he raced in to make it 5-3 to the hosts.

Boulogne almost set up another try on the half-hour when his up-and-under evaded Dimitri Yachvili. Boulogne beat Basque No.8 Laurent Tranier to the loose ball and passed to winger Lucas Borges who scored but found his try disallowed for a Boulogne knock-on.

Yachvili kicked three first-half penalties to give Biarritz a 9-8 half-time lead, but the second-half was all Albi, Romanian outside-half Iuliuan Dumitras kicking a 40-metre drop goal shortly after the restart, and Boulogne adding a penalty on the hour.

With Albi's pack in the ascendence, Dumitras kept plugging away at the drop goal attempts, finally adding a second and sealing the win from 40 metres four minutes from time. Boulogne tapped the nail in the Biarritz coffin with his third penalty a minute from time, and while Albi remain eight points away from safety, they can start to dream about lifting themselves off the bottom spot that has been theirs since week 3.