EOYT: France vs Samoa, 24/11/2012

[Surefire]

You saying that no Welsh fans thought a win was possible against Australia in June?

True, Wales lost all 3 matches closely. But nobody thought a win was impossible, in fact quite the opposite, making it even more frustrating that the team failed to win one. Also don't tell me nobody thought a win was possible against South Africa at the RWC.

Expectation that a win is possible and actually winning are different things.

Also it makes it worse and even more frustrating for France, that a team that beats the All Blacks and thrashes Australia, can also play such dull dross in the 6 Nations, lose to Italy with Mirco Bergamasco missing a dozen kicks, and have to rely on Canada to beat Tonga to get them through to a RWC quarter.

True Psychic, no one is denying the fact it is frustrating to be a France fan, I even mention it in my post. I also said that it is punctuated by those moments of sunshine. Your repeating the same line in two posts "of dull dross during the 6N" is my point. My comparison is how you would hate to be a France fan because of it against my opinion that the expectation of winning against the best competition in the world is worth it.

BTW, I was truly hoping for several wins by the Welsh during these internationals. I believe that once they get that monkey of their back, everything will begin to change. Until then, I am sure hoping, not expecting, is what most Wales fans will be doing when confronted by the big three.

 

[Surefire]

Just a question PD, are you expecting a win this weekend?

 

[Surefire]

That last post was a jerk comment PD, and I apologize. I always thought your posts were well thought out and informative. Truth be told because I will be cheering for the Welsh this weekend. And your main point is correct, it is difficult to be a France fan!

 

[Big Ewis]

lol okay, there are no Tiers 1 and 2. There are no genres in music, no intellectual movements in literature and philosophy...there's nothing distinguishable in this world.

EEEHHHHH OHHHHH !! Samoa calm down a little - just because you got Wales ONE TIME doesn't mean tiers stop existing all of a sudden ! :lol:

There are no tiers, no sky no ocean...
Heck, I ain't even typing this message right now, somebody else is.


Anyways: good luck Samoa, good luck France. You've both been VERY impressive this EOYT.

 

[Maxwell]

lol okay, there are no Tiers 1 and 2. There are no genres in music, no intellectual movements in literature and philosophy...there's nothing distinguishable in this world.

EEEHHHHH OHHHHH !! Samoa calm down a little - just because you got Wales ONE TIME doesn't mean tiers stop existing all of a sudden ! :lol:

There are no tiers, no sky no ocean...
Heck, I ain't even typing this message right now, somebody else is.


Anyways: good luck Samoa, good luck France. You've both been VERY impressive this EOYT.

Your tone resembles the German bobsleigh driver in the movie Cool Runnings - "Hey Jamaica you dont belong here" Samoa and all these other countries on the scene from Mongolia to Zambia are here to stay and without them the sport would still be languishing internationally like rugby league. Imagine the French domestic league without foreign players ? It would be like the EPL without foreign players, bland.

 

[Surefire]

lol okay, there are no Tiers 1 and 2. There are no genres in music, no intellectual movements in literature and philosophy...there's nothing distinguishable in this world.

EEEHHHHH OHHHHH !! Samoa calm down a little - just because you got Wales ONE TIME doesn't mean tiers stop existing all of a sudden ! :lol:

There are no tiers, no sky no ocean...
Heck, I ain't even typing this message right now, somebody else is.


Anyways: good luck Samoa, good luck France. You've both been VERY impressive this EOYT.

Yoe, I share your enthusiasm about current form from the French team, but your post is incorrect. This is not the first time Samoa has beaten Wales, and they are playing very well. Of all teams, France should not consider what "tier" an opponent is. France has beaten the highest ranked and been beaten by the lowest ranked of tourneys.

Samoa is powerful, hungry and not afraid of anybody. France will need to play a great game and keep focused to take this. It looks like most posters on this site were wrong about PSA, and they have good depth in most positions which should see them through this match.

 

[jaunard06]

Yes, I'm a huge stat fan. I love numbers and all. You'll never see England get SMASHED at home. There are many examples of NZ or AUS coming in November to Europe and crushing us, but having more difficulty in Twickenham. They've just got this "DO OR DIE !!" culture we don't regularly have. Of course because we're French, as stated before, we'll pull off victories we shouldn't - but then again other times we get smashed WAY more than we should...
Tied 16-16 at home and seeing the Ozzies reach 60 fakking pts (16-59)...that's not normal for a top5 nation, we ain't fking Spain for fk's sake !! What IS THAT ?!
That's a Tier 2 result.

The question IMO is not whether you get smashed at home or not but if you regularly underperform whatever is the context.
From that perspective it is clear that as you said we do it more often than let's say England - for other 6N teams it seems to me that even Wales or Ireland regularly plays beyond their level.
Personally I prefer see France lose big at home in a friendly and behave well in competition whether its at home or away. Recently England loses 36-0 against SA in World Cup, this is more difficult to accept because every team coming at WC had enough time to prepare for it - generally several months. France rarerly underperform in WC except for 3rd place matches which is here also a specific french issue: losing motivation for such matches is typically french.

Losing big against any SH team in november is a problem, but you cannot just putting away the fact that Four nations just ended and thus the SH guys played together for several months while the NH team generally had only several days to get prepared.

 

[jaunard06]

ZeFrenchy: I agree it would be nice to see Parra start. He is a better pure SH than Machenaud, but reviewing the last game against Argentina, I really liked the tackles and aggression of Machenaud. If Parra starts, I would not be unhappy, and I think Machenaud could handle kicking duties when he fills in.

Depending on the adversary one of the two players has to start: what I didn't like with Machenaud is that he offloads very slowly, but against Samoa having him for tackles I agree is necessary...it's not like if Michalak was a bad kicker.

A lot of posters here talk about the French being inconsistent, however I do not feel that is where the risk lies in this game. Last night I watched the Samoa/Wales game and thought that Samoa has every right to believe they can win this. Not becaus e France will lose it, but because Samoa will beat us by playing a better game. I believe France has more depth and talent, and that will be the difference.

Agree also, still you just cannot throw away IRB rankings. France has to win, everybody except Samoans expect it, not because they want it but because this is what the figures predict. And this is where frenchs usually show no respect...

 

[jaunard06]

I make that correction as there is a club side of my acquaintence that is a more frustrating team..............................

Biarritz is maybe not in very good mood currently but such a club can never really die...and I'm not a Biarritz fan (except when it comes to HC of course !)
Huge respect man !

 

[jaunard06]

And by the way, I would hate to be a France fan. The most frustrating team in the world, they should have won many more 6 Nations looking at their side on paper, yet their fans have to watch the dull dross that they played during the 6 Nations with Beauxis at 10, and most of the crazy Lievremont era.

I hate to say this but....I 200% agree with every single word here...

 

[ZeFrenchy]

Team announced. Parra in for Machenaud and Domingo and Kayser in for Forestier and Szarswewski.
Happy for Parra, I'm pro-Domingo, and quite indifferent betwee the two hookers.

I think, to reply to Jaunard, that Parra is a far better defender than Machenaud, despite the ~10kg difference. Parra always brings his man down, no matter the weight and power (see Ma'a Nonu), and whild Machenaud has one or two hits per game, his cover defence is defficient (see Argentina try), and he's a bit shier then Parra in the tight defence.
Parra is, for me, better in almost every single aspect of the game ot Machenaud. And, I assure you, this is not ASM bias... His service is quicker (though most people seem to disagree with me, except Jaunard), and far more accurate. His management is top-notch and he handles his forwards as if they were a bunch of well-behaved ten-year olds. His boxkicking has not been the best lately, but hasn't been Machenaud's.
Actually, I think the two best 9s in France for the future are Parra and Doussain (as a note: Machenaud is the same age as Parra...)
For the rest, I'd said it before; I would have liked to see Fofana at center, and Chouly and Picamoles together, but I'll give that PSA knows better probably. His group management has been very good, so he must have good reasons.

The side:
France: 15 Brice Dulin, 14 Wesley Fofana, 13 Florian Fritz , 12 Maxime Mermoz, 11 Vincent Clerc, 10 Frederic Michalak, 9 Morgan Parra, 8 Louis Picamoles, 7 Fulgence Ouedraogo, 6 Yannick Nyanga, 5 Yoann Maestri, 4 Pascal Papé (c), 3 Nicolas Mas, 2 Benjamin Kayser , 1 Thomas Domingo
Replacements: 16 Dimitri Szarzewski, 17 Yannick Forestier, 18 Vincent Debaty, 19 Jocelino Suta, 20 Damien Chouly, 21 Maxime Machenaud, 22 Francois Trinh-Duc, 23 Yoann Huget.

 

[Big Ewis]

Your tone resembles the German bobsleigh driver in the movie Cool Runnings - "Hey Jamaica you dont belong here" Samoa and all these other countries on the scene from Mongolia to Zambia are here to stay and without them the sport would still be languishing internationally like rugby league. Imagine the French domestic league without foreign players ? It would be like the EPL without foreign players, bland.

yes, yes you've uncovered the horrible truth behind my mask...I'm a raging evil racist who worships Satan, bahahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! !!!! ! !!...

Surefire:

dude I knowWales lost to Samoa before, I just mean in the wake of current events, Samoa are a bit too overhyped.

The question IMO is not whether you get smashed at home or not but if you regularly underperform whatever is the context.
From that perspective it is clear that as you said we do it more often than let's say England - for other 6N teams it seems to me that even Wales or Ireland regularly plays beyond their level.
Personally I prefer see France lose big at home in a friendly and behave well in competition whether its at home or away. Recently England loses 36-0 against SA in World Cup, this is more difficult to accept because every team coming at WC had enough time to prepare for it - generally several months. France rarerly underperform in WC except for 3rd place matches which is here also a specific french issue: losing motivation for such matches is typically french.

Losing big against any SH team in november is a problem, but you cannot just putting away the fact that Four nations just ended and thus the SH guys played together for several months while the NH team generally had only several days to get prepared.

Absolutely, I agree...I was terrified of that in fact ! Don't think it's fair one bit, I mean, conditioning/training/being ready is what it's all about !! And we had just like 4 days, but thank God we didn't seem to suffer from it, now did we ?!


psychic duck:
dude, you send me a fkn notification I click on only to read some "reputation comment" that goes "crappy posting"...srs ?! :lol: YOU SRS DUDE ?!
I think your posting is fkn pathetic, but I'm curteous enough to ride with it.

And ohhh yes, being a French fan is so terrible man, you're right...I mean, France hasn't accomplished anything in Rugby, like...ever...^_^
whaaaaaat tribulation oh, it's so awful ! You have no idea man, the heart-wrenching moments of being a France fan, ewwwwwwww...
ffffffahhh' gimme a break.

Four replacements:

http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,9817_8270351,00.html

Parra for Machenaud.

Your input on Machenaud so far for les bleus ?

 

[jaunard06]

Team announced. Parra in for Machenaud and Domingo and Kayser in for Forestier and Szarswewski.
Happy for Parra, I'm pro-Domingo, and quite indifferent betwee the two hookers.

I think, to reply to Jaunard, that Parra is a far better defender than Machenaud, despite the ~10kg difference. Parra always brings his man down, no matter the weight and power (see Ma'a Nonu), and whild Machenaud has one or two hits per game, his cover defence is defficient (see Argentina try), and he's a bit shier then Parra in the tight defence.
Parra is, for me, better in almost every single aspect of the game ot Machenaud. And, I assure you, this is not ASM bias... His service is quicker (though most people seem to disagree with me, except Jaunard), and far more accurate. His management is top-notch and he handles his forwards as if they were a bunch of well-behaved ten-year olds. His boxkicking has not been the best lately, but hasn't been Machenaud's.
Actually, I think the two best 9s in France for the future are Parra and Doussain (as a note: Machenaud is the same age as Parra...)
For the rest, I'd said it before; I would have liked to see Fofana at center, and Chouly and Picamoles together, but I'll give that PSA knows better probably. His group management has been very good, so he must have good reasons.

There's only one Ma'a Nonu in the NZ team, but the Samoa XV is only made of "Ma'a Nonus" !
I agree that tackling is for a big part a technical issue and does not necessarily require some physical density but it also depends how you defend: tackling as Parra does still alllows the attacker to offload before being tackled and the attacking team to progress. being bigger IMO doesn't prevent you to tackle effectively and still gives you other options like preventing the tackled player to give the ball: remember for NZ Byron Kelleher ?

Machenaud made a bad tackle but this can happen to anybody including Parra. So this is not an isue IMO, the biggest issue - and this is where we agree - is that Parra is better in every other aspect of SH.

Team announced. Parra in for Machenaud and Domingo and Kayser in for Forestier and Szarswewski.
Happy for Parra, I'm pro-Domingo, and quite indifferent betwee the two hookers.
The side:
France: 15 Brice Dulin, 14 Wesley Fofana, 13 Florian Fritz , 12 Maxime Mermoz, 11 Vincent Clerc, 10 Frederic Michalak, 9 Morgan Parra, 8 Louis Picamoles, 7 Fulgence Ouedraogo, 6 Yannick Nyanga, 5 Yoann Maestri, 4 Pascal Papé (c), 3 Nicolas Mas, 2 Benjamin Kayser , 1 Thomas Domingo
Replacements: 16 Dimitri Szarzewski, 17 Yannick Forestier, 18 Vincent Debaty, 19 Jocelino Suta, 20 Damien Chouly, 21 Maxime Machenaud, 22 Francois Trinh-Duc, 23 Yoann Huget.

Happy also for Parra, but I would have liked to see ASM 1st line - thus Debaty instead of Mas. Even though individually Mas and Szar are better, as a group it is obvious than having guys training all day together is a better option. Mas has been sanctioned against Argentina also if I remember correctly.
For Huget I really hope this is only until Medard comes back...
The rest of the team is the same as previously so that looks fine. I also would like to see Fofana as centre but this will probably not happen except in case of injuries.
And I have to recognize that Fritz did pretty well.

 

[Surefire]

Not upset about Parra starting. I agree with the above posters that he is a better overall SH. However this is true with the whole team, and this is what I keep referring to as France's advantage, depth. From what we have seen so far, you would have to be a very unruly fan to say that any of the players picked is a significant disadvantage to the squad. PSA, regardless, of what many thought is doing a good job on selection,management and getting the team to play as a team.
I personally have been a fan of Machenaud, I'm sure my posts reflect that, however I cannot argue that Parra is currently a better SH. Interesting note that they r the same age, I never noticed. My point is I am not sure between the two it would mean the difference of winning or losing.

 

[dullonien]

Quote 1 @ 7.47

Quote 2 @ 7.53

Quote 3 @ 7.57

Quote 4 @ 8.00

C-C-C-C-C-ombo post.

I think Cymro just died a little inside.

Edit. jaunard06, there's an edit post button at the bottom of your post. Also if you want to quote multiple posts, click the "+ botton for every post you want to quote (A tick will appear), then on the final post you want to quote, click the 'Reply with quote' button, and all quotes will appear in one reply.

 

[jaunard06]

C-C-C-C-C-ombo post.

I think Cymro just died a little inside.

Edit. jaunard06, there's an edit post button at the bottom of your post. Also if you want to quote multiple posts, click the "+ botton for every post you want to quote (A tick will appear), then on the final post you want to quote, click the 'Reply with quote' button, and all quotes will appear in one reply.

Hello dullonien,
sorry if I did anything wrong; actually I'm not sur to get the point: is it because I made individual replies to several posts in a row ?
Thanks for the tip anyways.

 

[Big Ewis]

anyone has any interesting points as far as comparing Parra and Machenaud ?...would be interested...

 

[dullonien]

Hello dullonien,
sorry if I did anything wrong; actually I'm not sur to get the point: is it because I made individual replies to several posts in a row ?
Thanks for the tip anyways.

Yup, it's generally better to combine them into one post. Keeps the thread tidier. Just a little friendly advice.

 

[TRF_Cymro]

Cheers Dull ... I did and sighed ....

 

[AfakasiAssasin]

Manu Samoa's team vs France
1. Sakaria Taulafo
2. Ti'i Paulo
3. Census Johnston
4. Filo Paulo
5. Iosefa Tekori
6. Ofisa Treviranus
7. Maurie Fa'asavalu
8. Taiasina Tuifua
9. Kahn Fotuali'i
10. Tusi Pisi
11. David Lemi
12. Johnny Leota
13. George Pisi
14. Paul Perez
15. Robert Lilomaiava

16. Ole Avei 17. Viliamu Afataia 18. James Johnston 19. Fa'atiga Lemalu 20. Tivani Fomai 21. Jeremy Sua 22. Ki Anufe 23. Reupena Leavasa

squad hit with injuries and suspension particularly at fullback. Lilomaiava playing the position is a concern as Im not sure how much he is experienced there and now he is starting vs the European powerhouse that is France.. Hopefully he'll swim not sink.

Let go Manu !