French delay naming team for Ireland clash
However, the delay isn’t entirely due to injuries to key players such as Fabien Pelous and Raphael Ibanez – Laporte and his backroom staff have been trying to preserve team spirit, which is on a high since beating Namibia on Sunday.
“All positions are being considered,” said Laporte. “We must try to be fair to everyone. It would have been unfair to tell a player on Sunday that he didn’t play well.”
With rumours of discord in the Ireland camp rife in France, Eddie O’Sullivan’s team selection, which was made as early as Monday, is being contrasted in the French media with Laporte’s decision to delay his announcement for more spiritual reasons, as L’Equipe put it yesterday.
For their part, the French players are already focusing on Friday night’s challenge against Ireland.
Lock Lionel Nallet was one of those who impressed against Namibia, contributing two tries to match those of fellow second-row Sebastian Chabal.
“I think that’s the first time two second rows have scored that many tries,” said Nallet. “I feel ready to play against Ireland, even though that’ll be a totally different game.
“I’m ready after my injuries but it’s up to the coach to see who he wants to play. I just hope I’ve made his job a bit harder. But the Irish know all about us. They will have shaken off their poor form by the time they play us.”
Almost as soon as the final whistle sounded on Sunday night the French coach had Ireland in mind.
“We have a lot of respect for Ireland,” said Laporte after the 87-10 win. “We know them well. It will be up to us to prove we are the strongest.”
Although Ireland have been far from impressive in their first two games, against Namibia and Georgia, their French counterparts have been slow to criticise them. Out-half Frederic Michalak, who did well against Namibia last weekend, said the Ireland-Georgia game didn’t come as a shock to him: “It didn’t surprise me. That kind of game is very difficult, and when it starts going wrong for you then it can quickly become very complicated, and even more difficult to win.
“We’ll be concentrating first and foremost on our own game — on our defence, which allowed us to do the right things during our preparation games before the tournament began, and on doing the basics right. We’ll also be keeping the same spirit.”
Yesterday Laporte was asked if he thought Ireland’s poor run would leave them unprepared for Friday night.
“People were saying the same things about Argentina before we played them,” he said. “That they were not ready — well, we saw what the result of that game was!
“Maybe Ireland have not played well so far, but they do have very good players who are always capable of producing big performances. They haven’t suddenly become bad players from one day to the next, so as far as we are concerned, we regard them as a top team and will concentrate on what we need to do to beat them.”
To that end, perhaps Laporte’s softly-softly approach to his team announcement seems to be working. With the absence of Pelous through injury, Lionel Nallet is bound to figure in Laporte’s thoughts.
Yet when he was asked on Monday if he’d be disappointed to miss out on the Ireland games, his answer couldn’t have been more team-oriented: “It’s always hard when you’re not selected to play, watching the guys. But we know that we won’t be playing all of the matches. The goal is to be World Champions.
“It’s hard but it’s important to be there and support the guys.”
Of course, now that France have a win under their belts, the atmosphere has improved all round. Yannick Nyanga is fielding good-humoured questions about his love of the movie 300 and his wish that the French players shout “We are Spartans!” in the dressing-room before games. The mobile phone of Sebastian Chabal’s agent is facing meltdown, with blue-chip clients like Kelloggs and Cadbury clamouring to offer the charismatic forward lucrative endorsement deals (it takes a minimum of €200,000 to get the bearded wonder to negotiate, if you’re interested).
The captain for last Sunday’s annihilation of Namibia, Jean-Baptiste Elissalde, however, sounded a note of caution: “I don’t want to hear any superlatives about our performance because only yesterday we were only good enough to throw in the dustbin. Don’t raise us up after knocking us down.”
Poitrenaud ; Rougerie, Jauzion, Traille, Heymans; Michalak, Elissalde; Dusautoir, Bonnaire, Betsen; Thion, Nallet; De Villiers, Ibanez (ou Szarzewski), Milloud.
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