France vs Samoa

[erwanseb]

Venue: Stade de France, Saint Denis
Date: Saturday 21st November 2009, 17.00 GMT
Referee:

French starting Line up
Médard (Stade Toulousain) - Fall (Bayonne), Marty (Perpignan), Jauzion (Stade Toulousain), Clerc (Stade Toulousain) - (o) Trinh-Duc (Montpellier), (m) Parra (Clermont) - Dusautoir (Stade Toulousain), Bonnaire (Clermont), Lapandry (Clermont) - Papé (Stade Français), Chabal (Racing-Métro) - Marconnet (Stade Français, cap), Szarzewski (Stade Français), Domingo (Clermont)
Replacements
Guirado (Perpignan), Mas (Perpignan), Millo-Chluski (Stade Toulousain), Puricelli (Bayonne), Dupuy (Stade Français), Traille (Biarritz), David (Stade Toulousain), Barcella (Biarritz)

Samoa Starting Line up
Lui - Mulipola, Fa'afili, Mapusua, Lemi - Fili, Poluleuligaga - Tuilagi, Treviranus, Fa'amatuainu - Thompson, Levi - Johnston, Schwalger (cap.), Taulafo
Replacement:
Williams, Fatialofa, Tekori, Timeteo, Mai, Fuimaolo-Sapolu, Esau

Both teams have significant changes from their first game where Samaoa came close to beating Wales while dominating at scrum time.
France quietly out played and outmuscled the boks with a strong dominat scrum.
2 first caps , Lapandry (20y) and Benjamin Fall (20y).

Samoa weakness: The line out, France likely to target this area
France weakness: The kicking game, TD not a kicker so the duty will fall on Parra.

Prediction: France but not comfortably

 

[Mr.cyclopede]

Well surprised by this beginning, in front of a team wich seemed to make problem to Walles last week

France 21 - 0 Samoa after 14 min

 

[Mr.cyclopede]

France 33 - 0 Samoa Half Time (but 3 easy penalties missed for Samoa)

Good alternance in the game, Samoa completely lightened off even if tackles stats are equals beetween the two.
Wondering if it's the same team for Samoa, and if it's so, if they didn't came to Stade de France via Moulin Rouge and Folies Bergères...

 

[Mr.cyclopede]

France 43 - 5 Samoa FT

 

[erwanseb]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Mr.cyclopede @ Nov 22 2009, 01:44 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

France 43 - 5 Samoa FT[/b]

meaningless result, only the Samoa scrum provided tough opposition, surprising.

France scoring early effectively killed the contest before it even started

 

[thomas]

Big big disappointment from a Samoan point of view, showed glimpse of the expected talent... impressive scrum though, or shall I say, impressive Census Jonsthon....
Good performance from France, Clerc is getting better everyday and looks more and more like the deadly-winger he was before his knee injury. On this game, I thought at moments that he was even better than before his injury...
Scrum was good but we are starting to be "Barcella and Mas" dependent... I thought Marconnet wasn't that stable at scrummaging, you could see the difference on the first scrum when Mas replaced him...
Midfield was ok, although I've always thought that Jauzion and Marty are not to be paired...
Now, a big headache for Lièvremont, for the backline, except Médard, Heymans and Clerc, the rest is up to current form and chemistry... personally I would go for a Jauzion-David pair, or even a Mermoz-David pair with Marty on the bench, that was really effective against the boks...

 

[Bernard]

Meaningless result i agree but at least it proves the capacity of this french team of keeping a good level . And it gives some playtime to substitutes which is not bad

for me , trinh-duc is proving more and more his ability , he has controled the match very well . I can't wait for France AB even if it think SH team are running out of gas on this tour (as maybe in the meantime NH are leveling up ..)...

 

[Melhor Time]

France were just way to good, weren't they? It was an effortless win. I thought Parra played badly. His clearance was not quick enough and his goalkicking is clearly not getting better.

The criticism of Trinh-Duc is surprizing. He is outstanding. Great passing and the strongest running of any 10 in the World at the moment.

Bonnaire did very well. He has to be one of the most underestimated players.

Samoa were unable to do anything at all. They passed the ball and never gained ground. It reminded me a bit of the 2003 World Cup match vs South Africa as they entered the game after a great performance vs Wales (ala vs England in the 2003 RWC) and conceeded plenty of early tries before eventually scoring one themselves in the second half.

Hopefuly Samoa can play more matches like this. It is shocking to think that this was their first ever game against France in France and only their second ever vs les Bleus.

 

[erwanseb]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Melhor Time @ Nov 22 2009, 11:27 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div>

Hopefuly Samoa can play more matches like this. It is shocking to think that this was their first ever game against France in France and only their second ever vs les Bleus.[/b]

France has a history (and a duty) of playing Pacific Islander (and other teams not involved in 3N/6N) teams at least once in November but it was mostly Fiji and The PI last year, we have not played Samoa that often surpisingly.

But the rendition of the Samoan anthem was excellent which was a huge improvement from SA game.