Ireland vs France - 09/03/2013

[big ginger 8]

I'm not so sure, he's full of confidence and I think he passes it on to the rest of the side.

That doesn't mean he's a leader. I think it's more his youth, flair and exuberance are infectious. More someone who has the potential to become a talismanic figure which IMO is different to a leader.

 

[lynam1104]

That doesn't mean he's a leader. I think it's more his youth, flair and exuberance are infectious. More someone who has the potential to become a talismanic figure which IMO is different to a leader.

This is exactly it before the Wales game there was plenty about what he was bringing to the camp, not leadership but youthfulness that was rubbing off on everyone. Definitely a good thing for the side.

 

[Aedaphon]

That doesn't mean he's a leader. I think it's more his youth, flair and exuberance are infectious. More someone who has the potential to become a talismanic figure which IMO is deifferent to a leader.

More importantly there's only so much leadership any player can manage from the wing. All time great wingers (Lomu, Campese, Robinson [-ish, Fullback but he played there often enough]) can inspire a team from the wing, but even they don't provide true leadership.

Not to detract from Zebo at all (I think he, Gilroy and Jackson are Irelnd's standout emerging players) but he doesn't seem to have that kind of quality, even if he might in the foreseeable future.

 

[igorBastia]

I will never understand my own country,which I love, even if my own parents ware no french. During the autunm it's seemed one of the best team in the world! then come the winter and we lost most of the matches. What happen during this time appart that the leaves felt from the threes!! The irish was dominant in the first half-times, tough, brillant, and the the french inexistant, then, sunddendly, in the second half-time the team seem to understand that they are playing a rugby matches against one of the best team of Europe, in Ireland, among Irish people. What happen during the half-time? Typical french, well I will drink a good scottish whisky given by a good scottish friend. In the name of the Auld Alliance!! I think then I am. Well bravo for the Italian team!

 

[Big Ewis]

yes, this has been an absolutely - but I just simply cannot stress how absolutely and fantastically - perfect year for the French inconsistency theory.
I thought we started off weird coz we were so tired and unprepared with the whole top14 calendar and all that, but weeks into the tournament it's obvious this isn't a valid argument anymore, it's just not the cause.

I'll be really, really worried the day France is mediocre for a year, and then the next, with nothing surprising. When our guys are simply just standard rugby players without that little extra spark France has always (well, since the 50's let's say...) had. But of course we all know this'll never happen !....

What I mean is this: (despite (again) the heavy and unfair relatively to the rest of the world schedule we have) if we do well this summer in NZ, it won't come as a surprise. It wouldn't be like, say, Japan beating Samoa. I don't think they have the very basic elements they need to perform that. If we win against NZ, all of a sudden, we'll be like "oh yeh, of course, forgot we could play like that...". It's there, it's dormant, and saying the Aussies and Argentina were worn out this November isn't fair simply (even regardless of the Aussies' next 3 important wins).

It's like 1999:
yeh we sucked balls during the 5N, winning only one match (against Ireland, by ONE point !...)...but then we come right back and beat one of the best NZ sides ever. All of a sudden we remembered "hey ! we've got nice forwards after all....hey, Dominici and Bernat-Salles are kind of amazing wingers; say that Lamaison fellow is kind of an excellent flyhalf..."

The potential is there, and France right now certainly is (has) much more than just a fkn scrum and Picamoles.

 

[gaston le gaff]

Try changing the coach and the results wil improve, if we keep him no World Cup Final in 2015!!!!!!!

 

[wertas]

France inconsistency is urban myth. Now they are constantly poor and it has to do something with coach, but not with players. Parra is included in starting line-up only in the third match. Michalak is out of form and offers nothing to the team. Fofana was wasted for a couple matches on wing. Some other questionable selections. No gameplan at all. France has to fire PSA and select new coach and build from scratch.

 

[psychic duck]

France inconsistency is urban myth. Now they are constantly poor and it has to do something with coach, but not with players. Parra is included in starting line-up only in the third match. Michalak is out of form and offers nothing to the team. Fofana was wasted for a couple matches on wing. Some other questionable selections. No gameplan at all. France has to fire PSA and select new coach and build from scratch.

Not really. They beat Australia 33-6 as recently as November and nearly won a RWC final after losing to Tonga earlier in the tournament.

 

[jaunard06]

It's funny to see that a few years ago we would have been 10+ points ahead in such a match after one hour, then suddenly ran out of fuel and barely win or being beaten in the last minute.
Now we can hold physically 80 minutes but struggle to even put in place a strategy and rely only on engagement and physical impact to (try to) win a game. I think that this is more worrying than PSA himself, BTW it started long before him.

PSA took weird decisions especially for his selection, but firing him will not solve long term issues. The issue being that we always want results now while we should rebuild on the long term - losing matches in the process, but when the WC is there we would at least have clarified and solved many issues. Here we lose matches but don't prepare anything.

We have to think long term or we will always remain with that famous "unpredictability" issue, that mainly comes from that fact that french players don't know themselves what they're going to do the next 5 seconds; sometimes it ends up with a fantastic piece of flair, and sometimes...FFR needs to get inspired by clubs like Toulouse, Irish provinces, Clermont, and other teams for which whoever are the players at any point in time, you seem to always see the same successful game characteristics. We won't win all the matches but we may lose some unpredictability.

The basis for performance IMO does not only rely in individual players quality - I dont think the quality of individual players in the french squad is questioned apart from Michalak, and even Fred has been very good before the 6N as well with France than with Toulon - but it relies also on consistency - to have a plan and stick to it -, from regularity and training, which implies using the same players or at least select a core of players per game area coming from a maximum of 2/3 teams as much as possible. Currently this is very complicated because either the national coach favorizes individual performance, or french players are very often pushed on the bench by foreign players, or major players are simply scattered.

Today if I want to build a major Top14 club very quickly it seems I will necessarily have to travel to Samoa and Georgia to build my front row, SAF or England for the rest of the forwards, Argentina, Australia, Fiji or New Zealand for the rest of the team; if I really can't find enough then France may become an option. Until now I don't have the feeling that doing this french clubs perform much better than their foreign counterparts. Toulouse has won more Boucliers than any other french team and still is a major provider for the national squad.

 

[Big Ewis]

good points up there jaunard...
and yeh you make an excellent point in that during the 2000's 6N we would typically lead any game (but vs England) and tries were pouring in, sometimes like diarrhea really...and then we'd commit silly mistakes in the 2nd half, put the foot off the pedal - remember that 2006 match against Ireland ?! the best example of that.
Right now, we look totally beatable every single match we've played since Feb. We look like this mediocre team that really doesn't have much, but it's really that we're confused and lost our confidence.

And French inconsistency isn't a myth, but it's just that it's a lot less 'magical' than ppl (like myself not so long ago...) would like to think. There are very tangible reasons first, but also a certain psychological temperament we've always had. As I've said many times, you take France against Tonga, we thought "yeh wtvr, we know, they're physical...okay, we get it...we won't underestimate them...fine, no problem..." - but we did. England for e.g. would never ever ever ever lose to Tonga the way we did. They will one day, but not *the way* we did. They'll play a college team like it's the AB because their culture is if they lose a game, it's the end of the world, and they MUST by all means win the game.
Or the AB as another good example, who'll never step off the pedal, not even at the 79th minute when they're up 100-0 against a Tier 3 nation.

We have this sort of attitude, like, of course winning is important but hey it's just one match. It goes back to our very nature...if you but lay a finger on the Queen, even new generation kids will get ****** off like INSANE (for a lot). With us, you can make fun of anything and we're cool with it, heck, our self-criticism goes beyond freedom, it's violent. There's a certain "old fashion" pride, which is both horrible and very good, in some peoples like England. We don't have that, which is both horrible and good...we're less drones, but we'll drop in intensity because a victory isn't as ABSOLUTELY VITAL as it is to other nations...

 

[psychic duck]

It's funny to see that a few years ago we would have been 10+ points ahead in such a match after one hour, then suddenly ran out of fuel and barely win or being beaten in the last minute.
Now we can hold physically 80 minutes but struggle to even put in place a strategy and rely only on engagement and physical impact to (try to) win a game. I think that this is more worrying than PSA himself, BTW it started long before him.

PSA took weird decisions especially for his selection, but firing him will not solve long term issues. The issue being that we always want results now while we should rebuild on the long term - losing matches in the process, but when the WC is there we would at least have clarified and solved many issues. Here we lose matches but don't prepare anything.

We have to think long term or we will always remain with that famous "unpredictability" issue, that mainly comes from that fact that french players don't know themselves what they're going to do the next 5 seconds; sometimes it ends up with a fantastic piece of flair, and sometimes...FFR needs to get inspired by clubs like Toulouse, Irish provinces, Clermont, and other teams for which whoever are the players at any point in time, you seem to always see the same successful game characteristics. We won't win all the matches but we may lose some unpredictability.

The basis for performance IMO does not only rely in individual players quality - I dont think the quality of individual players in the french squad is questioned apart from Michalak, and even Fred has been very good before the 6N as well with France than with Toulon - but it relies also on consistency - to have a plan and stick to it -, from regularity and training, which implies using the same players or at least select a core of players per game area coming from a maximum of 2/3 teams as much as possible. Currently this is very complicated because either the national coach favorizes individual performance, or french players are very often pushed on the bench by foreign players, or major players are simply scattered.

Today if I want to build a major Top14 club very quickly it seems I will necessarily have to travel to Samoa and Georgia to build my front row, SAF or England for the rest of the forwards, Argentina, Australia, Fiji or New Zealand for the rest of the team; if I really can't find enough then France may become an option. Until now I don't have the feeling that doing this french clubs perform much better than their foreign counterparts. Toulouse has won more Boucliers than any other french team and still is a major provider for the national squad.

I don't buy that "too many foreigners" thing.

You blame it for this year's poor performance. But the same situation didn't stop the 2010 Grand Slam, nearly beating New Zealand in the RWC final, beating Australia 33-6 in November, or the fact that statistically France are the most successful side in the 6 Nations era.

Also what specific French players aren't getting game time? Pretty much all of the France team are first choice at their clubs. And they benefit from being able to develop with the some very good foreigners around them. There are some situations like Buttin for example, but then you could argue the competition makes him a better player, and that if he can't keep Byrne out the Clermont side then he can't play for France. He can also always move to various other clubs if he wants more game time.

France have no excuse for the current poor performance. Currently they are using Michalak as scapegoat, but in my opinion the entire team and coaching staff need to take a look a long hard at themselves and their own failures instead of blaming one player or blaming the system.

 

[Aedaphon]

I don't buy that "too many foreigners" thing.

You blame it for this year's poor performance. But the same situation didn't stop the 2010 Grand Slam, nearly beating New Zealand in the RWC final, beating Australia 33-6 in November, or the fact that statistically France are the most successful side in the 6 Nations era.

Also what specific French players aren't getting game time? Pretty much all of the France team are first choice at their clubs. And they benefit from being able to develop with the some very good foreigners around them. There are some situations like Buttin for example, but then you could argue the competition makes him a better player, and that if he can't keep Byrne out the Clermont side then he can't play for France. He can also always move to various other clubs if he wants more game time.

France have no excuse for the current poor performance. Currently they are using Michalak as scapegoat, but in my opinion the entire team and coaching staff need to take a look a long hard at themselves and their own failures instead of blaming one player or blaming the system.

I don't think the problem is necessarily as exaggerated as it is being described but there is certainly a case to be made for foreign imports stifling the growth of top flight french talent. The fly-halves for the top 3 clubs in french rugby are Wilkinson, Macalister and James for Toulon, Toulouse and Clermont respectively. Trinh-Duc is the starting 10 for Montpellier (a key reason why I believe he should have picked over Michalak) but Montpellier does not have as strong European ambitions or pedigree as the other clubs stated above.

There are many, many talented French players in the Top 14 but at the very top clubs imports often play where up and coming French talent might otherwise be developed.

 

[Big Ewis]

DUCK: you're right. But it's not like that though, the team is not just looking around for ppl to blame. A LOT of french fans do that, yes, like, they'll find a scapegoat and pour it all on him. Like it's raining today "ah, it's Saint-André's fault !!!".

But it's true though that some are to blame for their clear incompetence atm rather than others. Obviously Picamoles, Para, the scrum (Domingo Mas and co...), Huget at 15 and to some extent Fofana are doing fine. They've got no looking in the mirror to do, well in fact they can admire themselves atm. But we all know it takes a team effort, and yes it's true we need a revival. Not huge lineup changes, not anything...just a revival. This group must and will eventually find its rhythm again, and then we'll all go like "ahhhh...so there's that November team, see, I told you !".
I know it's not as simple as just firing PSA, but who knows what exactly is holding us back right now...it's definitely true we look like shhyt on attack, well, much much shittier than we should at least...and the gameplan does fall under the coach's responsibility, even though he can't take all the blame and no one really knows how much he should take really...it's blurry. But surely he's in that for some, and I don't blame the selections too much, just a few here and there at times, but the team is great on paper right now.

 

[big ginger 8]

DUCK: you're right. But it's not like that though, the team is not just looking around for ppl to blame. A LOT of french fans do that, yes, like, they'll find a scapegoat and pour it all on him. Like it's raining today "ah, it's Saint-André's fault !!!".

No it's Kidney's.

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Bernard Jackman who coaches Grenoble was talking on RTE today and saying that the French academies don't get enough attention and that "French sides want short term success and put the future to the side". It's mad when you think about it, I read there's bigger money in French rugby than French soccer these days (PSG being the exception) and that division 2 players have part time contracts worth 52k a year, surely a lot ofthis money would be better spent on youth academies and player welfare which the French seem to be lacking in.

 

[big ginger 8]

Bernard Jackman who coaches Grenoble was talking on RTE today and saying that the French academies don't get enough attention and that "French sides want short term success and put the future to the side". It's mad when you think about it, I read there's bigger money in French rugby than French soccer these days (PSG being the exception) and that division 2 players have part time contracts worth 52k a year, surely a lot ofthis money would be better spent on youth academies and player welfare which the French seem to be lacking in.

Who cares about the players when you can just buy new ones.

 

[psychic duck]

I don't think the problem is necessarily as exaggerated as it is being described but there is certainly a case to be made for foreign imports stifling the growth of top flight french talent. The fly-halves for the top 3 clubs in french rugby are Wilkinson, Macalister and James for Toulon, Toulouse and Clermont respectively. Trinh-Duc is the starting 10 for Montpellier (a key reason why I believe he should have picked over Michalak) but Montpellier does not have as strong European ambitions or pedigree as the other clubs stated above.

There are many, many talented French players in the Top 14 but at the very top clubs imports often play where up and coming French talent might otherwise be developed.

If a French fly half plays well enough then they will get opportunities to play at the big teams. Last season, Skrela and Beauxis were first choice for Clermont and Toulouse. They were both dropped for the reason that neither were good enough, both got their opportunities and didn't take them.

Elsewhere in the league. Peyrelongue (Biarritz), Boyet (Bayonne) are first choice in their teams and have got caps with France but weren't good enough. Castres (Remi Tales), Bordeaux (Camille Lopez), Racing-Metro (Jonathan Wisniewski), Stade (Jules Plisson) all play French fly halves regularly as starters. Agen (Conrad Barnard) and Grenoble (Blair Stewart) both field fly halves qualified via residency.

None of those players can claim to have had lack of opportunity. The only teams that haven't given an opportunity is Toulon and Perpignan, where Wilkinson and Hook always play. Other than those two, they have all given opportunities and have French qualified fly halves.

 

[BZHopenside]

Beaxuis and Skrela are both pretty old though. Plus, Skrela's been battling injury since the World Cup. Beauxis, however, is indeed just not good. The Six Nations 2012 game versus England springs to mind.

 

[Tony Manx]

If a French fly half plays well enough then they will get opportunities to play at the big teams. Last season, Skrela and Beauxis were first choice for Clermont and Toulouse. They were both dropped for the reason that neither were good enough, both got their opportunities and didn't take them.

Elsewhere in the league. Peyrelongue (Biarritz), Boyet (Bayonne) are first choice in their teams and have got caps with France but weren't good enough. Castres (Remi Tales), Bordeaux (Camille Lopez), Racing-Metro (Jonathan Wisniewski), Stade (Jules Plisson) all play French fly halves regularly as starters. Agen (Conrad Barnard) and Grenoble (Blair Stewart) both field fly halves qualified via residency.

None of those players can claim to have had lack of opportunity. The only teams that haven't given an opportunity is Toulon and Perpignan, where Wilkinson and Hook always play. Other than those two, they have all given opportunities and have French qualified fly halves.

...I would say of the ones quoted, only perhaps Plisson or possibly Lopez could be future internationals as the rest are too old, injury prone or just plain not good enough or, in the case of Perylongue, played at 10 as there is no other choice (at least in the BO coaches minds).

Rugbyrama
The same 23 to face Scotland plus Flanquart

Published on 11/03/2013 at 18:15, updated on 11/03/2013 at 18:23

The coach of the XV of France Philippe Saint-André has decided to keep the same group of 23 players present in Ireland to tackle Scotland on Saturday at the Stade de France in closing game of the RBS 6 Nations in which the Blues have still not won.

Hit in the right shoulder in Dublin, Maestri spent the day in an MRI on Monday and will, however, be spared until Thursday. The Parisien, Alexander Flanquart , (23 years old) will be present in Marcoussis this week so training can be carried out at full strength.

 

[munstermuffin]

Bernard Jackman who coaches Grenoble was talking on RTE today and saying that the French academies don't get enough attention and that "French sides want short term success and put the future to the side". It's mad when you think about it, I read there's bigger money in French rugby than French soccer these days (PSG being the exception) and that division 2 players have part time contracts worth 52k a year, surely a lot ofthis money would be better spent on youth academies and player welfare which the French seem to be lacking in.

This is where French top shelf have to try sort something. But the money been thrown around isn't by the French Union but private business men who own the club and more they win the more profit they make