Valuse, combative and realistic, this reworked XV of France made a great match in New Zealand, despite the short defeat (31-27). The Blues were in the race throughout this first game of the summer tour, despite a second act dominated in possession by the All Blacks. Guillard, Villière and Woki scored the three French trials.
There was certainly no miracle, Saturday evening, at the Forsyth Barr Stadium. But that this French team “bis”, “ter” or even “quater” was beautiful, in Dunedin. And as these tricolors made proud, 18,000 kilometers away, the army of Fadas having ransacked his morning to attend this match. Courageous and even more in defense, sitting on a minimalist but effective game plan, the tricolor selection proved in the Great South that the French rugby reservoir was even deeper than you might have thought before this match. And at the time of turning our backs on the Otago region to join Wellington, a place of the second test, there are a few to pest against this four-point defeat, for which we would have signed with both hands a few days ago …
At the start of the match, the Blues struck the first. In his forty meters, Théo Attissogbe picked up a somewhat passive New Zealand defense- to say the less- accelerated frankly and found Emilien Gailleton inside. The action immediately bounced towards Gaël Fickou but the tricolor captain was stopped two meters from the New Zealand in-goal. At that time, Mickaël Guillard took the ball and flattened the first try in the match. Bim! A clim’dans a stadium that did not need it, Dunedin displaying that evening temperatures close to zero. Clearly, the All Blacks- so next to their pumps at the start of the match that their winger Sevu Reece had even knocked out by typing the noble Séant de Joris Segonds- nevertheless reacted in the process, marking two tests in blow by Will Jordan- following a beautiful jumped pass from Beauden Barrett- then by the Flanker Tupou Vaa’ii.
On the French side, the strategy was clear: endowed with the monumental right foot of Joris Segonds, the tricolor selection was therefore satisfied mainly to occupy the opposing camp, send the kiwis as far as possible from his in-goal before throwing himself, as possessed, on all the balloons released by the men of Scott Robertson. And there were lots of them, name of Zeus. The All Blacks are still at the start of the season, you see. Without too many landmarks and still very far, but then really very very far from their full power. As such, we could even have even been over this strange first act and as the indelicate Justin Marshall had done on the Blusaille before match, wondering which New Zealand team the NZru had therefore dared to send the recent winner of the 6 nations tournament …
Garthié: “They heard what he was said to have”
Was it because they had promised them that these tricolors, determined, united and disciplined, were blowing the finalists of the last World Cup, in the southern night? Was it for fear of living a long tour like a day without bread that the Blues played there as if their life depended on it? “They heard what they said about them since they set foot in New Zealand”had suffered Fabien Galkié some time earlier, feeling that the lever of fear, or that of vexation, would be able to reduce the alleged gap between New Zealand weighted with its best elements and the tricolor reservists. In the second period, Gaël Fickou’s teammates therefore marked, even twice, through Gabin Villière then Cameron Woki. Opposite, the blacks continued their festival, vomiting balloons in the air and often losing their duels. Finally, they only lasted with one in front of Romain Taofifenua at the end of the match the right to approach the next Wellington test by leading the 1-0 series…
