Must be the only thing he's right about these days then.

You're out of your goddamn mind.

On the match thread, I commented on every error Spedding made. I was very busy. One of the worst FB performances I've seen at any level this year. He scores a try, and everyone thinks he had a good game

And Vakatawa is not a XV rugby player. That bit where he was caught easily by the SA and ran into touch. Amateur. Watch how Mike Brown countered against Arg this evening.

He's right. Only lost by 22 this week. If he plays SA another 23 times, he might get a win

Someone should remind Guy that SA lost to Japan and Italy whereas Fra is losing by 3 converted tries + each game.

Revised rankings
1. New Zealand 94.78
2. England 90.14
3. Ireland 85.09
4. Australia 84.63
5. Scotland 83.90
6. South Africa 83.63
7. Wales 81.90
8. France 80.16
9. Argentina 79.31
10. Fiji 76.63
11. Japan 74.09

Good job Eng poached Eddie Jones or I reckon in 12 months Japan would be above France. I think this comes close to making France 3rd tier. Very close.

No. The first test was worse, appalling rugby, the amount of missed tackles was incredible.

[EDIT]: I was wrong, the ratio of missed tackles is identical as last week: 24%

Latest report card for Noves


If he were a schoolboy, he'd be making sure the dog ate it before his parents saw it.

PS Bernol not published its player ratings yet for the first time. Probably so bad for some they will be checking whether they can do zero.

Top 16 ( 2 x .
5/6 foreigners in the 23
5 years spent in France minimum to be eligible to play for France

We will be back in about 10 years.

And he gets that out again

About player ratings, this is a perfectly ridiculous (and de facto, completely useless in sense) article:
http://www.rugbyrama.fr/rugby/test-matc ... tory.shtml

What good does it do in any possible angle to assess every single individual when your team is playing collectively at the level of Italy, in fact lower than Italy as a unit. Typically French mentality. All about the individual. An inability to integrate the notion of 'team'. Those other national sides aren't playing THAT MUCH better, because their players are THAT MUCH better. We have a strong tendency here to think there's only and solely and nothing else, only the accumulated combined efforts of 15 individuals, and that very mentality, so deeply rooted, runs very deep and is the very reason the xv is doing so poorly.

...oh and btw, check this out. Forgotten too fast for the xv de France, in retrospect...:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rfwQiUjfSw

No surprise with suspensions and dim selections, France get arse reamed by SA in the U20s too.

So, Scotland win in Aus, their Rugby 7s teams is winning comps and their U20s just beat Aus too (and only lost 1 game in the comp).

France can only beat Tier 3 sides, 7s is an embarrass and yet another U20 comp where a whole load of talent is wasted.

Who should coach France Torq, who did you want appointed before Noves got the job?

Anyone but him. He belongs to an older time and has little to nothing to do with current Rugby Union anymore. You even have to question he can be a leader of men anymore that motivates his troops when you look at the xv de France, their body language on the field and their lack of hunger. He's just...powerless now. He can only lose games and then make excuses for them because it would be impossible to look at himself and come flat out to the obvious realization he's become obsolete and harmless to any opponent. He can only hold a defensive stance now vs the media and critics, and make up excuses.

Who in his stead ? I reckon Azema and staff from Clermont would've been a nice fit, especially seeing how he knows the backbone of the xv de France so well. He would've known how to set up a defense right, good use of lineout and scrum, the 9-10-12-13 axis with good attacking shape, would've used Lopez well with his tactical kicking, etc.

Eddie Jones, if he somehow hadn't signed up just earlier for the Eng role and accepted the challenge...would've been absolute gold. Likewise Vern Cotter, knows the culture, the country, fluent in the local language...knows the Clermont players well also...heck I reckon even a Conor O'Shea...

France are in dire need - yes, in NEED - of adequate modern technicians, and de facto most probably exterior/foreign influence. The French coach today (Azema aside) belongs to an old, quaint-at-best mindset of Rugby of a decade ago. France are delayed in almost every aspect of Rugby relatively to the top nations atm, as if in a parallel world, and the first thing is very obviously the mere basic functioning of a cohesive team. France are not able to even exist at all on a fundamental level, as an int'l side.

Clermont's big ol' bull.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29-WsPBBxQg

It was time for a foreign coach.

My issue with Noves was that it was 10 years too late. Noves was clearly locked in a bygone era which was proving catastrophic for Toulouse. A man on a mission to recover his reputation is not good ntl coach material.

Where are those tier 1 stats from? You beat Ireland and Argentina last year, Scotland and Wales at home in this year's Six Nations.



The two Laurents or the current Castres coach who took Oyonnax to the playoffs and the HEC are good options. If you went foreign it would probably be Quesada or Cotter who know the current French systems.

On the midol website Jeff Dubois finally talks about the difficulty players are having stepping up from boshball in the FLOP 14 to the quick intl game...



No s**t Sherlock...


Same old same old.

As has been said for nearly a decade now the type of rugby played in clubs and the calendar are killing our intl side...

just that, ay ?

Priority should be in changing the format indeed.
That, in itself, is the biggest challenge facing French rugby.

And then, limit imported players.

Was Guy talking about T14 or himself?

Anyway
and this could be from any of n tests from Tin-Duck........... and still he gets selected at FH.

Generous. As per comment on match thread, he covers more metres sideways than forwards. And he didn't make the try anyway.

Yup. Hard on Serin because he has made a lot of progress but he still just ships the ball on (see thread again) and too often gets Parra like. Decent backup but please let us see Dupont given a run to work out if he is up to the job.

He quoted Jeff Dubois.

Was he talking about T14 or Guy?

17 games Noves has had in charge. Anyone want to claim that he can see any improvement over PSA?

Anyone?

Sadly got caught all afternoon and didn't get to watch the car crash, but from the reports...

- it's amazing how shit Picamoles has become since he signed back into the T14. Best league in the world, now players don't even have to play to become shit, just having a contract is enough!
- about 65% possession *and* territory and we manage such a score? That has to be a record. If those stats are true, then the team had to be doing something right.
- with his name on the list despite having never played a pro game and the capacity of every french 10 to attract attention not-in-a-good-way during internationals, Ntamack Junior will be on the bench for the 6N (I don't think Guy will dare the autumn internationals) and start at the world cup.
- i'm very much looking forward to the Boucherie's XV de France facebook wall.

Ntamack jr was pretty awful in the games he played. Jalibert looked a lot more assured in bits we saw of him. Then, of course, they played Couilloud at FH for the last SA game (and he's a SH.....) and they were hammered.

Those possession v non conversions stats: Dork will remember but I think they may have been worse against Eng or Ita during the 6N. Maybe Wal too given 20 mins of scrums at the end.

Dude. Elite list.

Nepotism.

He's still a kid so let's hope he improves. Reminds me of a young Michalak: has some moves but kicking game is hopeless.

I wish him good luck and hope he's got enough brains to see past the bullshit... Famous name, nepotism, most exposed position in the team, far from a vintage era for the french XV, he's ticking every box for an even worse car crash than Bezy.

oh yes yes, Noves' France are quite simply an aberration of a Rugby team from a statistical pov...

What do you guys predict for Test 3 ? I'm going to go with a third defeat. I don't think as some will suggest SA will surrender under pretext they've won the series. It was never a hard fought, competitive series, and they'll in fact I predict relish the chance of putting yet another 40, maybe more this time on that poor France side now that they've won just a weeee bit of confidence back. They're young, hungry (l'appétit vient en mangeant...) and they'll want to run.

France will flail in all directions defensively and on attack like string-controlled marionettes, more or less hard - but for certain thoroughly randomly - and ehm well concede summore tries and fail to score a vast majority their own chances of them.

I NEEEEEEVERRRRR thought it possible after being subjected to that monumental ordeal back 3 years ago, but I reckon...I reckon this series might be even a worse display of Rugby over 3 tests than Australia June 2014. Which mere notion is simply mind-boggling. That tour was the Rugby equivalent of inescapable debilitating depression.

It has every chance of being worse. France clearly a rabble and lost interest whereas the Boks now have no pressure. We can hope the Boks get sloppy I guess.

Sexy couple of hookers right here. Did some good dirty work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhArbux8NL8

cela étant, le TOP 14 n'a pas empêché les argentins de courir comme des poulets sans tête en coupe du monde, et de mettre la misère à tout le monde .... alors quoi ?

C'est franchement incompréhensible. Picamoles vient de faire une énorme saison en Angleterre, les rosbifs le badent et l'élisent meilleur joueur de la saison, il débarque en équipe de France et c'est un fantôme. On a l'impression que ces joueurs baissent de trois niveaux dès qu'ils enfilent le maillot bleu. C'est désespérant.

ouais, et à mettre en perspective avec les rosbifs et assimilés qui performent en juin...

Je crois que quand on sent la fin des cours arriver, c'est dans notre sang, on est obligé de venir avec des cartes et un ballon de foot dans le sac plutot que ces conneries de bouqins et de cours à la con. Merde alors !

A people that created l'apéro can't also be a champion of rigor. The Germans will put together the most technically functional football team you've ever seen, but then when it's 3è mi-temps they've got the sense of humor of 12 year olds stuck at first level jokes.

France have always produced major talent, but have always had a really hard time tapping all the potential out of it. How many times has the xv de France lost to lesser England teams if you went by player for player ? It was always going to become a problem when Rugby tightened up and became a science of strategy and team cohesiveness; France survived off sheer talent for long enough, although they never captured the ultimate Grail of Rugby glory, and mind you they've had more talented teams than the '95 or 2007 Springboks for e.g.

Greatest back rower of all time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9W67xWWz9Q

You'll go onto ignore if you keep that up

on fait quoi de france 98 et du hand cela dit ?

you wouldn't do that. I'm the only guy who makes sense on here, and you KNOW IT.


I don't know football enough and I don't know how things were in 98 in particular as far as coaching/strategy etc in that sport, but I reckon France won based on talent, lots and lots of talent ? Anyways, I KNOW I haven't seen a French soccer team play like the prime German teams, although I was very happy to see France beat Germany at the last Euro.

Handball is individual based, it's like basketball: talent wins championships. You won't get a whole lot of answers or deep lessons out of handball titles - although I'm very happy they're doing that well, personally.


But look jolindien it's too long to describe but Rugby has become so demanding on the collective level, it has nothing to do with Rugby of a decade ago.
Listen to this !: the other day I was just rewatching the Ireland France from 2007 (remember, V.Clerc scores at the end, dramatic win, that one) and being so accustomed visually to watching current Rugby every day every day all the time, you know what it felt like ? It felt like the field was enoooooormous, like the players were tiny small little figures on an ocean-sized field overwhelming with space, yaaaaards of green and length and width, and like the game was slowed down. Every try looked so easy to score, long stretching seconds for the passes to be made, players taking their time...I couldn't believe this was just 2007. I'd forgotten it was that bad.

Compared with today...there's NO space. Defenses cloggggg it all up. Players are bazooka-athletes and a team covers a field in a few seconds. A pass has no margin of maneuvering to be made. And every aspect of the game has become a super-mega concentrated, tighter version of what it used to be. It wouldn't be enough today to get back the Jauzion Servat Heymans Chabal and co., you'd NEED the right structured setup handcrafted by the best modern technicians anyways !

mwais... mbof... mais nan.