There's no return to action for 40 of Federale 1's 48 teams - including our adopted favourites Le Bugue - as the biting cold weather chews up the fixture list. Al Buga still manages to concoct a match report though...

Le Bugue vs Vallée du Girou postponed: Le Bugue need to win their last four games to have any hope of reaching the play-offs. The visit of bottom club Vallée du Girou should have been the springboard before it fell foul to the icy conditions. Les Chevalliers' first match for five weeks will now, weather permitting, be away at third-placed Graulhet instead.

Which is a shame as lock Florent Castenetto was busy telling the Sud Ouest newspaper that Le Bugue were ready to take all five points on their return to action.

"We have no choice now, we must win this match if we want to avoid the worst. And we can't just win, we need the bonus point.

"In the first 20 minutes we have to win the ball and not allow them a chance to score. We will be starting again, with a full hamper. We're better that them and we shouldn't have too many problems, but we must be careful.

"I think we've shown in the last two or three matches that we're good enough. When we've managed to get our act together we can be very effective. Against Perigueux [in the last match], we pulled it together and scored, and did it again at the end. It wouldn't have been daylight robbery if we had won, even if Perigueux did have 80% of the posession. There have been a lot of games like that, but that's in the past - tomorrow, we have to take the five points."

Co-president Thierry Thébault was also in a positive mood. "It's clear that we need to take all five points on Sunday," he said.

"The boys have worked hard during the [Christmas] break. Morale is high and they are on form. They're going to give it their all to be in the best possible position at the end of the regular season so that we can be sure of staying up."

The rearranged match should be played on the weekend of January 31. In the meantime, let's just hope the optimism stays high for next week's much tougher clash with Graulhet.

Second string: Le Bugue B vs Vallée du Girou B postponed

Also in Pool 6: Tyrosse 25 Oloron 3; Perigueux vs Graulhet & Langon vs Lourdes postponed

Next up: Graulhet vs Le Bugue, Stade Noel-Pélissou, Sunday 17 January. Apart from the fact that Graulhet have won five games to Le Bugue's two (and yes, we know that's a pretty significant 'apart from', but bear with us here...), the two teams' records are pretty similar. Le Bugue have scored 16 tries to Graulhet's 10, and have only conceded one more (14 to 13), but where les Chevalliers have succumbed to narrow defeats, their opponents on Sunday have scraped valuable wins against the likes of Perigueux and Lourdes, and even pulled off a win at Langon.

Of course, Graulhet also took four points from their visit to Stade Renaud-Cruveiller in October, their forwards dominating throughout to beat a dishevelled Chevaliers 19-11. Centre Nicolas Boutie scored the visitors' try that day, and he remains one of three players to have played every minute of Graulhet's campaign (flankers Julien Barbara and Emmanuel Bleys being the others, as you asked). With Vallée du Girou the next visitors to the leather town's Stade Noel-Pélissou, they'll see a chance to strengthen their tenuous grip on a play-off place and kill off Le Bugue's faint hopes once and for all.

The news Fed-lines: Only four games took place this weekend as snow and ice hit most of the Hexagon. Tyrosse became the first team to secure a place in the Trophée Jean-Prat play-offs with a straightforward 25-3 victory over Oloron. Thierry Dupré extended his lead at the top of the Federale 1 points scorers' chart with 20 points from six penalty kicks and the touchline conversion of centre Benjamin Lolom's try on the stroke of half time.

In pool 3, Beziers put some room between them and second placed Nice with an 18-12 win on the Cote d'Azur. The hosts were leading 9-7 at half time, three Julien Caminati penalties outscoring Jonathan Bousquet's converted fifth-minute try, but Beziers struck back after the break, Pierre Julien's try and two penalties from Jean-Baptiste Dambielle sealing the victory for the 11-times French champions, who now need just two more points to qualify for the finals.

Pool 5 leaders Valence d'Agen suffered a surprising defeat at seventh-placed Mauleon, the hosts coming back from 9-14 down at half time to win 17-14 and keep their hopes of a play-off place alive. Further down the pool, Lavaur moved into third with an 11-5 win at bottom club Morlaas, the hosts claiming a bonus point with a 79th minute try. While the top four teams in each pool have their slates wiped clean for the play-off round, the bottom four in each pool take the points they've earned into the 'play-downs', so every little helps, as they don't say at Carrefour.

You can find all the latest Federale 1 results at ItsRugby.fr

Fédérale 1 Pool 6 table: