17 April 2010: Last-minute try for Racing flanker Bernard le Roux confirms their place amontg the elite, Toulon beat the champions to go top and Bourgoin and Montpellier leave Bayonne and Montauban scrapping for survival

Racing-Metro 29 Biarritz 22; Toulon 33 Perpignan 23; Clermont 25 Castres 19; Bourgoin 15 Toulouse 13; Bayonne 33 Brive 15; Montauban 6 Montpellier 19; Albi 38 Stade Francais 24 - Latest league table

Racing-Metro qualified for the Top 14 play-offs and next season's Heineken Cup with a last-gasp 29-22 victory over Biarritz.

Flanker Bernard le Roux was the hero of the hour, completing a remarkable comeback for the Parisians with a 79th minute try created by a charge from Sebastien Chabal.

The score came after a long spell of Racing pressure and sealed a complete turnaround from a first half which saw Biarritz take a 14-0 lead, Dimitri Yachvili kicking an early penalty before the Basques' Heineken Cup hero Damien Traille took advantage of their limited territorial gains with two 25-metre drop goals.

Iain Balshaw made it 14-0 with a try set up by hard yardage from Imanol Harinordoquy and Fabien Barcella, and although Jonathan Wisniewski kicked a penalty on the stroke of half-time, it looked as though the Parisians' hopes of a play-off place in their first season back in the top flight would be dashed by their visitors.

Between Icelandic volcanoes and French train strikes Biarritz had had no idea how they would get to Paris, before eventually flying from Biarritz to Lyon on Friday and taking a TGV to the capital on the day of the match. Four hours in the buffet car didn't appear to be having any negative effect, as after Wisniewski kicked his second penalty to make it 14-6, a superb 30-metre break by Damien Traille saw the ball passed along the line before centre Karmichael Hunt raced in to score for a 13-point margin.

Racing struck back on 55 minutes, the forwards setting up base camp in the Biarritz 22 before barging over the try line, flanker Johnny Leo'o being awarded the try after careful scrutiny from the video ref.

Andrew Mehrtens' conversion made it 19-13, and despite Yachvili adding another penalty on the hour, Racing started to pressurise their visitors, and three goals in five minutes from Mehrtens tied the scores and the expulsion of Iain Balshaw for holding on to the ball meant the hosts went into the final 10 minutes with an extra man.

The intensity of the finale became clear when Harinordoquy went off with a broken nose courtesy of another Chabal charge, and as the Parisians got on top, Mehrtens saw a 30-metre drop goal drift wide, and it was left to the combination of Chabal and Le Roux to send Racing into play-off dreamland.

Toulon and Perpignan had already qualified for the final rounds, but with the top two earning a bye to the semi-finals, their clash at Marseille's Stade Velodrome would have a big effect on the make-up of the play-offs.

Toulon turned out 33-23 winners in front of the 57,000-strong crowd, Luke Rooney scoring two first-half tries and Jonny Wilkinson adding 23 points with the boot in the form of five penalties, two conversions and two drop goals, including a 50-metre drop five minutes from time which denied USAP a bonus point.

The mammoth drop also halted a Perpignan comeback, flanker Gregory Le Corvec giving the visitors hope with a 72nd minute try after a spell of Catalan pressure. USAP had been worth the 13-all scoreline after half an hour, Farid Sid scoring a 25th minute try to add to two Jerome Porical penalties.

Wilkinson's second-half kicking display put paid to Perpignan's resistance, and the Catalans will also be smarting after losing winger Julien Candelon for the rest of the season to a broken arm.

For Toulon, the win made it eight league victories in a row - three more and they could be lifting their first Bouclier since 1992.

Before first played second, third faced fourth on Friday night, Clermont recovering from a 5-13 half-time deficit to beat Castres 25-19. Castres had even led 16-12 going into the last quarter, a try for winger Marc Andreu and 11 points from Romain Teulet outscoring tries for Clermont's Marius Joubert and Elvis Vermeulen.

But a Morgan Parra penalty followed shortly by a try from Gonzalo Canale swung the game Clermont's way, and Parra kicked a second penalty from the touchline 10 minutes from time to put les Auvergnats two scores clear.

With all these internecine struggles going on around them, Toulouse might have been expected to make ground on the top four with a win at lowly Bourgoin, but it was the Easterners who were celebrating Top 14 safety with a 15-13 win over the fifth-placed aristocrats.

Toulouse scored the only try of the match after just nine minutes, David Skrela dinking a kick over the hosts' defence for Gregory Lamboley to gather and feed prop Virgile Lacombe who had only to fall over for the score.

All Bourgoin's points came from the boot of full back Alberto di Bernardo, the Argentinian keeping them in the game as David Skrela converted Lacombe's try and added two penalties.

Toulouse winger Vilimoni Delasau almost set up a match-winning try for his new club in the final 10 minutes, but the attack was held up 10 metres from the line, and after threatening to steal the win with a 50-metre drop goal attempt, Di Bernardo stepped up to complete the job with a 73rd minute penalty from the game distance. He missed a chance to extend the lead in the final minute, but Bourgoin had already sealed the win and, providing they can get their financial house in order, can look forward to another season in the top flight.

Bourgoin are only four points clear of the drop zone in 11th, but are safe because the two teams in 12th and 13th, Bayonne and Montauban, meet in a winner-stays-up encounter this weekend.

Bayonne climbed out of the relegation zone with a 33-25 win over Brive. The Basques were 23-3 up after the break when winger Sam Gerber scored the second try of the afternoon, centre Thibault Lacroix scoring the first on 20 minutes. But Brive hauled themselves back into the match with tries from Jamie Noon and Jean-Baptiste Pejoine making it 26-18 to Bayonne going into the final quarter.

But the sky blues weren't going to be denied a win in their last home game of the season, and Ross lock Filipo barged over from a scrum-five to restore the 15-point advantage. Fabrice Estebanez did manage a late consolation for Brive, but it wasn't enough to keep them in the hunt for a play-off place, and Bayonne climbed to safety, for now at least.

They travel to Montauban on Saturday, a trip that is far less daunting that it might have been given the current physical and mental form of the Sapiac outfit. Relegated for financial mismanagement, Montauban are appealing against the decision, but that appeal will be moot if they finish in 13th place anyway. Squad members withdrew a threat to boycott the Bayonne game, but even if they hadn't, they couldn't have done much worse than they did in losing 19-6 to erstwhile relegation rivals Montpellier.

The nip-and-tuck, bagarre-laced kicking contest between Montauban's Julien Audy and Montpellier's Federico Todeschini (Francois Trinh-Duc reminding us of his presence with a 64th minute drop goal) was eventually settled by Trinh-Duc himself, dashing over four minutes from time for the only try of the afternoon.

Two teams with nothing to play for met in the other match of the weekend, relegated Albi securing their first win in 11 games with a 38-24 victory over Stade Francais.

Paris outscored their hosts by four tries to three, Antoine Burban and Mirco Bergamasco giving the half-time score a respectable appearance after Benjamin Lapeyre's boot had kicked Albi into a 12-0 lead. Lapeyre added two more penalties either side of half time before winger Dave Vainqueur grounded in the corner to put Albi 23-12 ahead on 52 minutes.

Before long it was an astonishing 38-12 to Albi. First scrum-half Kevin Boulogne latched on to a Paris up-and-under and raced 50 metres unopposed to score his fifth try of the season on his farewell appearance at Stade Municipal - he leaves for next week's opponents USAP in the summer. Three minutes later Bourgoin pounced on loose ball and fed Lapeyre, who darted round the Stade Francais defence to score a try of his own.

The visitors made the score look slightly more respectable thanks to late tries from Lionel Beauxis and centre Guillaume Bousses, but the defeat merely put the seal on a miserable week of a miserable season for the former champions. Next week they host a triumphalist - dare we say coq-au-houp - Racing-Metro in the Paris derby - defeat could see them finish as low as 10th.