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The Crusaders have signed Pablo Matera for the 2022 Super Rugby season. Matera will move from Paris, France to Christchurch, New Zealand to continue his professional rugby career. It will be the fourth country that Matera has played professional rugby in. He previously played for the Leicester Tigers (UK), Los Jaguares (Argentina) and presently plays for Stade Français (France).
The 27-year-old is among the leading Argentine players; he is the captain of Los Pumas. In 2020 Argentina made history by defeating New Zealand for the first time. Matera captained Argentina in the 25-15 win over the All Blacks in Sydney, Australia. He and Stade Français teammate, Marcos Kremer, were the starting flankers.
Pablo Matera explained that the move is for the 2022 Super Rugby season.
“Stade Français were very understanding and suggested that I go play a season of Super Rugby and then come back to Paris to complete my contract.”
The Pumas captain will thereby not play for State Français in the 2021-2022 season. In other words, Matera will play the rest of the 2020-2021 season for the Top 14 club and join the Crusaders at the start of 2022. Between July 2021 and January 2022 he will play for Argentina. Los Pumas will play three test matches in July, six in the Rugby Championship and three end of year matches as part of the November Internationals.
Crusaders Head Coach Scott Robertson commented:
“Pablo is one of the premier loose forwards in World Rugby. He’s a skilful and tenacious player with genuine leadership qualities, who has impressed us with his physicality and work ethic. We’re really excited about him joining us next season, and sharing his experience with our young loose forward group who are learning their craft.”
The Crusaders are the mos successful team in Super Rugby history. The Christchurch-based team were Super Rugby champions in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2017, 2018 and 2019. The Crusaders also won the inaugural Super Rugby Aotearoa in 2020.
The 2019 Super Rugby final saw the Crusaders defeating Los Jaguares. Matera started at flanker and earned plenty of praise for his performance in the final. It was his final match for Los Jaguares. His decision to sign for Stade Français saw a change in the captaincy. Matera led Los Jaguares in 2018 while center Jerónimo de la Fuente was the captain in 2020.
Matera has 69 caps for Argentina. He made his test debut as a teenager against Chile in May 2013. Three months later he was starting for Argentina against South Africa in the Rugby Championship. In what was a difficult season for Los Pumas, Matera was a standout performer. He went on to play in Rugby World Cups 2015 and 2019.
