Method in madness as Bleus play to strengths

Rugby/France v Ireland:It could hardly have come at a less opportune time. Gerry Thornleyon the bracing wind of change blowing through Paris

Toward the end of last Saturday's stunning win in Murrayfield, the French launched another counterattack from inside their own territory. At 27-6, the game was long since won. Moving over the halfway line, Cedric Heymans slightly overran a pass from the replacement hooker, Dimitri Szarzewski, and the ball went to ground. Patrolling the sideline, the assistant coach Emile Ntamack turned away angrily, frustration palpable.

This remodelled French team are aiming high. They are not just flinging the ball around for the sake of it. Aside from the emphasis on sound set-pieces, they have retained the aggressive, superbly honed defensive system introduced by Dave Ellis as well as the manager Jo Maso from the unlamented Bernard Laporte regime.

And there is plenty of method to the apparent madness. It is "heads-up" rugby as distinct from headless.

Quickly responding to Dan Parks's initial drop goal, despite playing much of the first quarter in their own half, they moved 17-3 in front. As they varied points of attack and made full use of their outside three - Vincent Clerc, Heymans and Julien Malzieu - everyone was alive to quick taps or counterattacks, and the ball-carrier always seemed to have one or several support runners behind him. It is playing to their strengths, and having fashioned openings, they expect to finish them.

Never mind the forward pass or lucky bounce of the ball for two of their tries, they could easily have scored another three or four. Helped by an infusion of new young talents, trust has been given back to the players. They have been liberated and no one embodies this more than Ntamack.

Scorer of 24 tries in 46 Tests for Les Bleus, "Milou" was an athlete and footballer before discovering rugby. Nicknamed "The Panther", he flourished in the unstructured game at Toulouse. His speed, physique and intelligence enabled him to play fullback, wing and centre, and his most frequently used words when talking about rugby are plaisir and risque.

Working to a four-year World Cup cycle, as opposed to paying lip service to it, France are braced for blips along the way - and we can hope one will occur today.

ALL THIS STARTED WITH the decision of their outgoing FFR president, Bernard Lapasset, to entrust the revolution to Marc Lièvremont, a 35-year-old coach of limited experience who had just guided Dax to promotion from the second division. He brought in Ntamack, co-coach to the World Cup-winning under-20s two years ago with Didier Retière, who was also brought into the back-up staff as the forwards coach.

French rugby desperately wanted a break from the constraints and emphasis on discipline of the eight-year reign of Bernard Laporte. "Crazy Bernie" was credited with the tactical coup over the All Blacks in the World Cup quarter-finals, albeit with selective moments of typical French brilliance for both tries and the telling introduction of Frédéric Michalak for the second of them.

But when an unchanged XV lost their nerve in their semi-final, most of the French media that night in the Stade de France were sanguine about the lost chance. The repeated verdict was that France had not played true to their heritage and did not deserve to win.

Come the embarrassing third-place dissection by Argentina in the Parc des Princes, whenever the camera panned on Laporte's distinctive visage, the "minister for sport in waiting" was roundly booed, yet some stayed to applaud the players' lap of honour after the full-time whistle.

Already sensing something revolutionary in the air, the French media and public were quick to row in behind the new era, all the more so after the daring win over Scotland.

Laurent Benezech, analyst for l'Équipeand former international, enthused: "There is a real break in strategy (from the Laporte era). That was obvious. There were a lot of passes. The backs were not afraid to run from inside their 22. It was even 'quasi-systematique'. You can sense the Toulouse imprint of Emile Ntamack. Now the forwards must put themselves at the service of their backs to have a team of very high level. This way of playing is, of course, helped by the breeding ground developed by Toulouse and Clermont."

Indeed, whereas Laporte increasingly drew from the big three of Toulouse, Biarritz and Stade Français, and to some degree from Clermont and Perpignan, Lièvrement and co have delved much deeper into France's pool of talent; witness the introduction of three 21-year-olds from Montpellier, heretofore without one capped player in their history - outhalf François Trinh-Duc, lightning-quick openside Fulgence Ouedraogo and number eight Louis Picamoles. Significantly, though, 12 of the 24 players used in the opening two rounds come from Toulouse and Clermont, and not only are those the leading two sides in France but they also play the most ambitious rugby.

By rights, the job should probably have been given to Guy Noves, a prophet in his own land and 14 years the head coach of Toulouse, in which time they have remained true to the near-utopian principles of running rugby and education, as established by Jean-Claude Skrela and Pierre Villepreux in the 1980s. But the fiery, slightly maverick Noves has been too outspoken a critic of the FFR, and possibly would prefer to remain at Toulouse anyway. Besides, by gambling on the new ticket, Lapasset and co were seen as "depoliticising" the management and coaching of les Bleus.

Lièvremont was a teak-tough if, by his own admission, relatively limited flanker who played 25 times for France between 1995 and 1999.

"Tackling isn't a technique, it's a state of mind," he is wont to say in voicing what was a rugby truism even in his playing days.

AS YOU PASS STADE DE FRANCE en route from Charles de Gaulle airport this week you notice (the traffic gives you plenty of time) a neon sign interchanging "10 ans" and "10 years", and it was exactly a decade ago that Lièvremont made his first appearance in the Six Nations, against England in the first rugby match at the ground.

"I haven't a physique for creating terrific openings nor for catching balls in the lineout, so my job is tackling," he said modestly before the game. True to his word, he made 18 tackles that day after coming on as a 16th-minute replacement, and remained a fixture in the starting team for two years.

When asked afterwards by Maso why he hadn't played with the same fervour the previous summer in Australia, Lièvremont replied, in reference to then captain Abdel Benazzi, "Because there was a leader for whom I had no wish to break myself."

Such an uncompromising attitude saw him leave Stade Français after winning a second French championship with them in protest at the way a cabal of players had instigated the removal of his fellow Catalan Georges Costes as coach.

Born in Dakar while his father was based there, and a very devout mother, Lièvremont was one of five brothers all named after Apostles and encouraged to play rugby - Thomas, a fellow backrower, also played 36 times for France. Both of them first played for their native Perpignan, where Marc was a fireman before embracing professionalism.

His long-term aim is to go one better than he did as a player, when playing in six of France's World Cup matches in 1999, culminating in his last Test, the final against Australia, when Skrela was coach.

In a clear link with the '90s (and Toulouse of the '80s), all three of these young coaches have worked with Skrela, head of the French Federation's National Technical Direction at Marcoussis.

"WE WANT TO CONTINUE working in accordance with the National Technical Direction," says Lièvremont. "So there's the matter of moulding and of detection, with the aim of bringing to light talents which tomorrow will supply the French team. With Didier (Retière) a product of the DRN, 'Milou' (Ntamack) having been through it, we have a 'DTN sensitiveness'.

"We can plan more easily with 2011 in mind, in truth beyond that, to anticipate the hatching of talents. The ideal would be to have arrived, in World Cup year, having it 90 per cent done."

That said, in the build-up to his first game as coach, against Scotland, Lièvremont went on to say, "I hate losing. It's out of the question to prepare for a match and be thinking about losing. But victory will come from the outcome of character and discussion. I wouldn't say absolutely that a good defeat is better than a bad one. But almost . . . It's true that there are lots of new things for us, notably the mediating aspect. But we have no feeling of being under particular pressure from our rulers and the president Bernard Lapasset."

To the slight frustration of French journalists Lièvremont is reluctant to shout from the rooftops or provide soundbites about change from Laporte's methods and reminds everyone the French team must first rely on the basics: "The fundamentals are absolutely the backbone. There's no opposition between strength in the basics and the open game. There's combat everywhere. It's omnipresent. It's a sport of collective combat before being a sport full of movement."

His players too, even the Toulouse ones reputedly ill at ease with Laporte's restrictive ways, follow suit. For example, Heymans told journalists, "I'm warning you at once that I'll not compare Bernard Laporte's methods and those of Marc Lièvremont."

But later, when discussing the new methods, he conceded, "They know precisely where they want to go. Their game principles are very clear," before grinning, "and it's true they're not far removed from the jeu Toulaisain."

But what about this from Trinh-Duc before the Scottish game, considering he was a 21-year-old debutant outhalf? "There are responsibilities and I'll take them. The coaches want a less-stereotyped, more open game. It's true that number 10 is the patron of the backline but I'll take my role readily. The outhalf steers the game. I'm very happy that I've been asked to manage the game.

"It's a plan that suits me. During the World Cup, one didn't sense a great game of movement, and I think that's what was lacking to reach the end. We have to find again that French flair which was lost, play from all over the field, that everyone enjoys, both on the pitch and in the stands."

Lionel Nallet may have been a surprise choice as captain outside France, but again, typical of the contrasting thinking of the new regime, there was a prevailing feeling during the World Cup that the Castres lock was actually the best secondrow in Laporte's 30-man squad.

Despite a rangy, two-try performance in Nallet's solitary start, that restorative rout of Namibia in Toulouse, Nallet not only lost out to Fabien Pelous in the starting line-up but also to Sébastien Chabal's impact potential as a lock-cum-backrow on the bench.

The 6ft 5in Nallet may be a tough, uncompromising figure in the engine room, but he clearly embodies what Lièvremont wants from his leader on the pitch.

"La victoire est belle," said Nallet before adding, in what might denote a key difference from the more rigid structures in place formerly, "The players enjoyed it. I will especially remember the solidarity shown as there were difficult moments when we were dans le rouge. Each time the players would encourage each other. There was huge solidarity."

You takes your chances in the new, revitalised French set-up, for it was the debutant lock Loïc Jacquet, captain of the Under-20 World Cup-winning team, who tapped the penalty and passed to Malzieu.

"The tap penalty by Loïc Jacquet reflects the state of mind we showed," said Nallet. "He takes a decision and everyone follows behind. We were asked to take initiatives. There are some who take them, and whether they're good or not, we have to stick behind them." France are back.