2023-09-19 10:00:00
After a complicated decade for the French XV, French rugby has returned to the forefront. And an entire nation has the goal of becoming world champions, at home, during this 2023 World Cup. Could we have imagined this five years ago? Since a narrowly lost final against New Zealand (8 to 7) in 2011, the French XV has experienced mediocre results. The defeats kept coming. The 2015 World Cup was marked by a historic defeat in the quarter-finals, again against New Zealand (62-13).
Philippe Saint-André, former international player (68 caps) and third best scorer in the history of the French XV – with 32 tries – notably coached Toulon and the English club Sale before becoming the coach of the French XV in 2011. After four years, he left his place to Guy Novès, himself replaced by current coach Fabien Galthié after the 2019 World Cup.
Point : You participated in two World Cups (1991, 1995) as a player. French rugby was, at the time, one of the best nations. What are the differences with today?
Philippe Saint-André: Nobody knew us at the time. I remember the 1991 World Cup, which I participated in. We were running on the beach as a team and everyone was wondering who was who. It was still an insider sport, not very public and not well publicized.
Today, there are 15 million spectators watching the match against New Zealand, and even for France-Uruguay, 11 million. For a match against the 17th nation in the world, it’s totally crazy! Rugby has become a major sport in France and the World Cup is one of the four biggest competitions in world sport. There is nothing comparable between the competitions of 1991 and 2023. And then, this generation has simply exceptional players, including Antoine Dupont, the best player in the world. It helps !
When you were coach of the French XV, French rugby was not doing well. How, ten years later, could everything have changed?
When I was coach, French clubs won titles with at least fifteen foreigners in their squad. From the “Jiff” [Joueur issu des filières de formation, NDLR], implemented after the 2015 World Cup, clubs must use, on the match sheets, sixteen players trained in our country. Thanks to this, our young people have playing time and gain experience more quickly.
Clubs also had to invest in training centers and hire quality coaches. It is no coincidence that we are third in the world rankings and that we have won three Under-20 World Cups in a row, which has never happened before. For the last competition in this category, the two best players of the team, Émilien Gailleton and Louis Bielle-Biarrey, were missing because they were with the “big” French team. In short, we give our players more time and, thus, we put the church back in the middle of the village. The federation, the league, the clubs understood what was needed for the good of French rugby.
There was also the effect of the “Salary Cap”. This process was established in 2010 by the National Rugby League to avoid salary inflation and an imbalance in the championship. Presidents must cap their club’s payroll. This ceiling is currently 10.7 million euros.
We now have an incredible player pool. For each position, we have three to four international level elements. We were complaining at the time about not having a fly-half, now we have Romain Ntamack, Matthieu Jalibert, Antoine Hastoy and even Louis Carbonel who is not far away. Ten years ago, all positions were taken by foreigners.
We saw a complicated match against Uruguay. Was Fabien Galthié right to rotate his team so much?
Yes, it’s normal that he rests twelve players. Group dynamics are very important. He makes everyone play during the first matches so that all the players feel involved. When I was coach, after the first victory against Italy during the 2015 World Cup, we had a complicated match against Romania. And the problem is that the substitutes want to shine individually to be able to reach the team which will play in the final stages. As a result, they forget the “dirty work”, as we say in the jargon, that is to say the defensive withdrawals, the shadow work which is very important.
Which players do you think are essential in this team, apart from of course Antoine Dupont?
Grégory Alldritt is really a key player in this France team. He constantly moves the team forward, even in set or slow sequences, he also has the ability to restart the ball. Jonathan Danty, too, is very important: he constantly moves forward and creates fixation points. Against Australia, he was monstrous. There is also Uini Atonio, who is at the top of his game. In the first half, he was the one who completely destroyed the New Zealand scrum. He tormented his opponent, recovered two scrum penalties. Damian Penaud has made thirty attempts. He’s only two tries away from me! The ratio of tries to number of matches is totally crazy and I think he will soon overtake Vincent Clerc (34 tries) and Serge Blanco (38 tries). So much the better: all records are worth breaking.
#Rugby #World #Cup