2014 6 Nations: Scotland vs France (Round 4)

[Maverick1987]

mediocre and totally lackluster and then brilliant all of a sudden...in the image of France as a whole...

Jim Telfer apparently had this to say about this coming match: "To be honest, I don't see how France can win this. Of course they can surprise us but our players are used to playing them. If Scotland can't beat France, that will mean we're really bad".

Man, fk you Telfer ! What an assshole !!

Don't worry he spews all sorts of crap about us . He's a bit geriatric so we let him off

 

[Big Ewis]

I know but just the phrase: "I don't see how France can win this". Gotta love utterly exaggerated quotes like those bordering on the plain bizarre. I think it just shows the general sentiment of pride Scottish fans have in their team through this downfall situation: in stead of just gnawing on every little piece that's thrown at them, they'll just make comments like "Scotland has never been this bad", or "if we lose this we're really bad". So I rather like that attitude.

But as it's touched on in another thread, Scotland is a nation of football first and foremost, and being a small nation, atm they're really struggling to keep up with those other 6N sides. I do believe, and will be very eager to see, that Vern Cotter will really make valuable changes to the culture of this team and better results will follow.

 

[Scotsmanslanj]

mediocre and totally lackluster and then brilliant all of a sudden...in the image of France as a whole...

Jim Telfer apparently had this to say about this coming match: "To be honest, I don't see how France can win this. Of course they can surprise us but our players are used to playing them. If Scotland can't beat France, that will mean we're really bad".

Man, fk you Telfer ! What an assshole !!

Well that's f***ed that then. Has he not heard of Sod's Law?

Bit harsh. If Scotland win it'll no be a walkover. They're going to have to play a sight better than they have so far...

And the Scottish weather weather has let us down! No rain affording us the opportunity to drag the beautiful game of rugby into the mud and grind out a win.

 

[Scotsmanslanj]

But as it's touched on in another thread, Scotland is a nation of football first and foremost,

Aye, but what's annoying is our football team, national and league are even more p*sh than our rugby! At least if we are obsessed with girly round ball we could be good at it!!!!

 

[Big Ewis]

mmm, wait n see what Cotter does to your national side. A coach and the culture he brings is everything in a team. I think France are a fabulous example of that: good if not very good players throughout the 23 (and well beyond, great depth) and we couldn't buy a win last year and look the worst we've ever looked since before the 1950's when we started being good.
And again, not for a lack of good players on the pitch: best scrum statistically in the world, Picamoles, Parra, very good backs incl. Fofana, Huget, Dulin...

As long as your players play with heart and pride, there are no two ways about it: coaching staff is doing something wrong.

 

[Big Ewis]

k if France lose this, the Scottish posters can refer to me as "Big Bish" for a couple of weeks. But just the Scottish posters !!!
I'm really sure France won't lose it, so I deserve punishment if I'm wrong.
I reiterate my claim: France by 10+.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

k if France lose this, the Scottish posters can refer to me as "Big Bish" for a couple of weeks. But just the Scottish posters !!!
I'm really sure France won't lose it, so I deserve punishment if I'm wrong.
I reiterate my claim: France by 10+.

And all the other posts shall just call you "That loony Frenchman"?

 

[TRF Mr Fish]

And all the other posts shall just continue to call you "That loony Frenchman"?

Fixed that for you

 

[Big Ewis]

And all the other posts shall just call you "That loony Frenchman"?

mmm nah, too long, not catchy enough...you can call me "master" if you desire, I'll endorse that much, but I'm not exactly concerned by your posts (unlike you with mine, I see) so call me anything that magnificent little mind of yours can conjure - your call, go wild !!

Papé has promised a lot more discipline than in Cardiff for us. He says we'll be "exemplary"...well we were very good in discipline recently against England for e.g. so why not...
I'd say I'm really excited to see all those changes (basically half the team with 7), and obviously Mach and Lapandry starting is definitely going to be interesting, and Vahaamahina at the 6 or Mermoz back at center, but what I really want to see is continuity in the plays, in the attack movements. Doesn't have to be fancy, just, nice and simple but consistent and effective.
If we can't do that, the crisis is deeper than expected.

Scotland: 15 Stuart Hogg, 14 Tommy Seymour, 13 Alex Dunbar, 12 Matt Scott, 11 Sean Lamont, 10 Duncan Weir, 9 Greig Laidlaw, 8 Dave Denton, 7 Kelly Brown (c), 6 Johnnie Beattie, 5 Jim Hamilton, 4 Richie Gray, 3 Geoff Cross, 2 Scott Lawson, 1 Ryan Grant.
Replacements: 16 Ross Ford, 17 Moray Low, 18 Euan Murray, 19 Tim Swinson, 20 Ryan Wilson, 21 Chris Cusiter, 22 Duncan Taylor, 23 Max Evans


France: 15 Brice Dulin, 14 Yoann Huget, 13 Mathieu Bastareaud, 12 Maxime Mermoz, 11 Maxime Médard, 10 Jules Plisson, 9 Maxime Machenaud, 8 Damien Chouly, 7 Alexandre Lapandry, 6 Sébastien Vahaamahina, 5 Yoann Maestri, 4 Pascal Papé, 3 Nicolas Mas, 2 Brice Mach, 1 Thomas Domingo
Replacements: 18 Guilhem Guirado, 17 Vincent Debaty, 18 Rabah Slimani, 19 Alexandre Flanquart, 20 Antoine Claassen, 21 Jean-Marc Doussain, 22 Remi Tálès, 23 Gaël Fickou

 

[Big Ewis]

There's a point I left out. Parra is almost certainly the key personnel we'll be missing the most. Not just for his quality in-game, but for his boot come penalty/conversion time.
If we are to win this tournament, it'll be on pts diff. And we can't just score a ton of tries from now in MF til Paris while hosting Ireland; we'll need to count on the boot and collecting as many little pts as we can, every conversion, and a vast majority of penalties.

Discipline and defense will be key as well as scoring a lot but conceding as much just won't cut it. We'll absolutely need a fine margin of victory here if we are to have a chance at all. We spoiled our 20-pt win against Italy with a 21-point loss in Cardiff, what a disastrous waste...

As unlikely as it seems here, France needs to rack up about a 20pts difference tonight in Edinburgh.

 

[jaunard06]

I see Scotland winning this one and not"barely as some french press were suggesting. Scotland is in progress, winning in Italy is difficult for every team, even England struggled already there.
On the other side France after a good start but that could not mask all the lacks and weaknesses of that team especially when controlling the ball, were ridiculous against Wales.

With 7 changes versus the last match I can't see how that team could suddenly find a team spirit and inspiration. Missing Nyanga who's been one of the satisfactions in the previous games is a pain, we're lacking a good 3rd row, Picamoles will feel alone today.

And Vern that's going to leave us to train Scotland...happy Scots, with such a coach, you'll leave us far behind...

 

[iINDOMINUSxx]

k if France lose this, the Scottish posters can refer to me as "Big Bish" for a couple of weeks. But just the Scottish posters !!!
I'm really sure France won't lose it, so I deserve punishment if I'm wrong.
I reiterate my claim: France by 10+.

hello Big Bish

 

[Tony Manx]

I see Scotland winning this one and not"barely as some french press were suggesting. Scotland is in progress, winning in Italy is difficult for every team, even England struggled already there.
On the other side France after a good start but that could not mask all the lacks and weaknesses of that team especially when controlling the ball, were ridiculous against Wales.

With 7 changes versus the last match I can't see how that team could suddenly find a team spirit and inspiration. Missing Nyanga who's been one of the satisfactions in the previous games is a pain, we're lacking a good 3rd row, Picamoles will feel alone today.

And Vern that's going to leave us to train Scotland...happy Scots, with such a coach, you'll leave us far behind...

I have to say that I have a sneaky feeling that jaunard06, you are correct in the result but have to say that I reckon Vern Cotter is absolutely bonkers to be leaving Clermont to go to Scotland unless he has had a huge row with the owners/sponsors, wants to drive Pirelli instead of Michelin, prefers gingers to blondes and that his doctor has told him to give up red wine and drink whisky instead!! I know it can get cold up there in Clermont but at least the sun shines on more than just four days a year....

 

[jrZielinski]

im going to look back at the last 2 games of scotland vs france

France 23 - 16 Scotland Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd7YAfmRSls
Scotland 17 - 23 France Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_7_quuZcsY

As from those games scotland looked really close of a win over france but we had unlucky moments even though we aren't on the greatest off forms but have definitely improved from the start off the six nations and scotland did have a hard fixture list this year. but france im predicting a france win so thats my mother going to be happy. but if france play like they did against wales and wasting big opportunity which france had plenty off against wales. scotland should win.

but im going to have to say the final score i think will be scotland 20 - 23 France i think it will be extremely close this year but france will get the edge.

 

[jrZielinski]

I have to say that I have a sneaky feeling that jaunard06, you are correct in the result but have to say that I reckon Vern Cotter is absolutely bonkers to be leaving Clermont to go to Scotland unless he has had a huge row with the owners/sponsors, wants to drive Pirelli instead of Michelin, prefers gingers to blondes and that his doctor has told him to give up red wine and drink whisky instead!! I know it can get cold up there in Clermont but at least the sun shines on more than just four days a year....

kind to say we get atleast 4 days, more like 1 sunny day per century even though its sunny today but yeah that the last sunny day for us until next year

 

[Big Ewis]

I see Scotland winning this one and not"barely as some french press were suggesting. Scotland is in progress, winning in Italy is difficult for every team, even England struggled already there.
On the other side France after a good start but that could not mask all the lacks and weaknesses of that team especially when controlling the ball, were ridiculous against Wales.

With 7 changes versus the last match I can't see how that team could suddenly find a team spirit and inspiration. Missing Nyanga who's been one of the satisfactions in the previous games is a pain, we're lacking a good 3rd row, Picamoles will feel alone today.

And Vern that's going to leave us to train Scotland...happy Scots, with such a coach, you'll leave us far behind...

oh ye of little faith...have you learned nothing from the past decades of French Rugby ??

hello Big Bish

EYYYY !!!!!! Shiit ain't come down yet, son !!

 

[jaunard06]

I have to say that I have a sneaky feeling that jaunard06, you are correct in the result but have to say that I reckon Vern Cotter is absolutely bonkers to be leaving Clermont to go to Scotland unless he has had a huge row with the owners/sponsors, wants to drive Pirelli instead of Michelin, prefers gingers to blondes and that his doctor has told him to give up red wine and drink whisky instead!! I know it can get cold up there in Clermont but at least the sun shines on more than just four days a year....

Coaching a national team is always a plus, we will miss him a lot after all what he brought to the club.

Great coach, great man.

 

[Tony Manx]

Bloody hell......listen to Davies going on about Picamoles and his yellow card when I have seen all sorts of people clapping the ref in an ironic way without comment over the last number of seasons......and why PSA dropped him for that I cannot understand.

If they want to start on that road.....what about stopping all the appealing to the ref for knock ons, mauls, forward passes etc etc that is now commonplace on the rugby. The noise from the players is ridiculous....when was it that the only words you heard addressed to the ref came from the Captains!! What about the appeal for vidoe ref when it is stated that no player has the right to ask for such...it is not bloody cricket!!!!

Don't you just love Gobby Gabby though...nice shoes too!!

 

[TRF_Olyy]

C'mon you Scots!

I want them to win tonight, then France to come back and beat Ireland next week, so an England win tomorrow can set them up for the ***le going in to the last game.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

Oh looks at that, the Scots have put out the flags of both nations this time. Hope Scotland win just to take France out of the running. France losing here, England winning tommorow and then France beating Ireland would be ideal. The only way England stand a chance otherwise is if our seniors do what our U20's did to Wales, which I would very much like to see.

EDIT is it just me or did the French in the crowd completely mess up the timing of their own anthem?