The Blues missed out on their first match of the year against XV du Trèfle on Friday evening in Marseille.
France Télévisions – Sports Editorial
Published on 02/02/2024 22:55 Updated on 02/03/2024 00:16
Reading time: 2 min Irishman Tadhg Beirne scores his team’s second try against the French XV, in the opening match of the Six Nations Tournament, in Marseille, February 2, 2024. (CLEMENT MAHOUDEAU / AFP)
Three and a half months after their defeat in the quarter-finals of the World Cup, the Blues took another blow to the head. For its first match of 2024, the French XV sank against Ireland (17-38), in the highly anticipated opening shock of the Six Nations Tournament, Friday February 2, at the Vélodrome stadium in Marseille .
The Blues played most of the match at 14 against 15 after the two cards – yellow, then red – received by Paul Willemse, definitively excluded after half an hour of play. Overwhelmed against a solid and precise Irish collective, weighed down through their indiscipline, the Tricolores were dominated by their opponents and were never able to get back into the game, despite some brilliant moves while outnumbered.
An unrecognizable XV of France
The Blues wanted to banish the ghosts of the World Cup quarter-final, but they added new headaches. Friday evening, in the cool of the Marseille night, they fell from a height. Feverish, guilty of approximations, the French did not put themselves on the level of their evening opponent, who immediately entered his match. Authors of the first points of the match on penalty (3rd) then the first try of this Tournament on a well-constructed offensive and concluded by Jamison Gibson-Park (17th), the Irish made life difficult for Fabien Galthié’s men (56% possession, 60% occupancy in the first period). Day 1: France – Ireland summary. – (France TV)
But the French also weighed themselves down, notably because of chronic indiscipline, like second row Paul Willemse. Sanctioned with a yellow card after a first dangerous clearing (9th), the Montpellier, who celebrated his return to the blue jersey after missing the World Cup due to injury, was finally definitively excluded twenty minutes later following a new shoulder-to-head collision (32nd), shortly after the second Irish try (30th).
First bad series of the Galthié era
In difficulty throughout the match, and even more so in numerical inferiority, the French defense left too much space, as on the second and third tries conceded, and the Irish took advantage of this to unfold and offer themselves a large improved victory (five tests). The renewed panache at the end of the first period to seek, on the siren, the first French try of the evening, and the good sequence to return behind the line after returning from the locker room (52nd), changed nothing in a match which could leave traces.
Day – Gaël Fickou: “They outclassed us in all areas”. – (France TV)
For the second time since the arrival of Fabien Galthié on the bench in 2020, the XV of France has had two defeats in a row. He also suffered his biggest defeat with this coach. With this setback against the title holders, the Blues are already saying goodbye to their Grand Slam dreams and are falling behind the men in green in winning the trophy. Already under pressure, they will travel next Saturday (3:15 p.m.) to Edinburgh to face Scotland on the second day.