Urrunarrak is one of the clubs that plays in the Ligue de Pelote du Pays Basque Championnat du Pays Basque 2017 - Xare - 1ère série. By itself, this is not particularly noteworthy. The league has 8 other teams that are vying for a championship. However, what does make Urrunarrak unique at the moment, is that the club produces videos of its home matches. I had never seen a Xare match before I discovered their Youtube site. My first Xare match was Urrunarak v Hardoytarrak, played on October 2, 2016. Details of the competition and the match can be found at the link above. Details about what Xare is and how it is played are available in English here. Or here, en Francais. The key to the game is the implement, the xare.
Because the meshwork of the racquet is so loose, putting the pelote in play is a combination of hitting and catching/throwing, somewhat, but not exactly analogous to the way the joko garbi cesta is used. And because the sport is played on a trinquet court, a short (28 meter) court with some of the ornamentations that are central to Main Nue, the pelote moves very quickly and unpredictably. The sport emphasizes quickness and finesse.
The pelote doesn't move as fast as in Jai Alai, but the game progresses tremendously fast. Even long points go very quickly. That was the first thing I noticed about the sport. 40 point matches rarely take an hour to play. The one I watched had 65 points and was played in less than 42 minutes by premier club teams. The longest point I saw took 43 seconds. It consumed 16 balls in play. I'm not exactly sure which point it was because of the difficulty keeping score. It was near the end of the match.
October 2, 2016
Urrugne Fronton (1) (2)
Hardoytarrak (Anglet) (Driolet-Sistiague) defeated Urrunarrak (Urrugne) (Urchueguia-Moncada) 40-25. Hardoytarrak is in green shirts. Urrunarrak is in red shirts.
Pelotelive.free.fr match page.
Full match video Note that there is no scoreboard. The match scores are called out but you have to listen very closely. I never did get the linescore to a point where I could release it to you with confidence. Perhaps you will.
These two teams also played each other in the semi-finals of the 2014-15 Championnat de France on February 5, 2015. There is full match video for it as well (without sound). The video is from a different angle and a scoreboard is clearly visible, making it very useful in learning the sport. It can be found at pelotelive.free.fr here (Hardoytarrak is in white--match begins at 4 minutes 22 seconds on the video). Make sure to DESACTIVER PFF'S auto-refresh feature below the video or it will not play properly.
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