player-coach until the outbreak of the Great War. The club (all sports combined) paid a heavy price, with around forty deaths on the battlefields. During the 1927-1928 season, the first team won the title of Côte Basque champion for the second consecutive year. Subsequently, it finished first in its pool of 5 in the French championship. In the following groups of 4, it defeated Stade Français, USA Perpignan and Lyon OU as well as the defending champions Stade Toulousain in the semi-final by 3-0 after extra time (1 try at zero). Section paloise won the final by beating Quillan 6-4 in Toulouse in May 1928. That day the local newspaper, Le Patriote, reported that the "berets" beat the "hats". Before the war, the Section paloise won the Challenge Yves du Manoir in the 1938-1939 edition against RC Toulon by a score of 5-0 after extra time, courtesy of a try by Desperbasque and transformed by the full-back Courtade. After WWII In 1946, at the end of the war, the club was once again crowned French champions. Section Paloise, won the prize, beating the likes of Toulouse and Agen. In spite of some uninspiring results during the first phase of the championship, Section successively beat Stade Toulousain in the quarter-finals and Perpignan in the semi-finals (6-3 after extra time) to reach the final against their neighbours from the French capital. However, guided by a series of 12 consecutive victories, FC Lourdes were largely defeated 11-0 at the Parc des Princes in Paris. The press noted then that the Section had a very homogeneous team without "stars" but with a perfect physical and moral condition. Theo Cazenave, Pierre Lauga and captain André Rousse are some of the figures of this remarkable XV. Section Paloise lost in the semi-fi+nals of the 1950 French championship against the future French Olympic champion, Castres Olympique. After a French Cup semi-final in 1951, the team won the Yves du Manoir challenge in 1952. In 1959, François Moncla, then international and title holder with Racing Club de France, became captain and a new, younger team was formed. The team slowly took its bearings and in 1964, Section Paloise became French champion for the third time, beating the great Béziers 13-0. Its stars at the time were Moncla, Piqué, Capdouze, Saux, Etcheverry and Abadie. However, all had started badly during this season, the press even published a headline in