JAMES HARRINGTON
FRENCH COLUMN
After this weekend's Top 14 matches, Fabien Galthie's chosen 42 will head to FFR's spartan ‘Marcatraz' headquarters for the pre-November internationals training camp.
There were no real surprises in Galthie's selection. Even the nine uncapped players – Thierry Paiva, Thibaud Flament, Florent Vanverberghe, Florian Verhaeghe, Tani Vili, Donovan Taofifenua, Matthis Lebel, Maxime Lucu, and Romain Buros – have been on the selectors' radar for some time.
Of those who missed out, La Rochelle hooker Pierre Bougarit may consider himself unlucky in the absence of Camille Chat, but his was always a toss-up call with Peata Mauvaka for the third hooking slot, after Gaetan Barlot powered into the back-up position with three impressive performances in Australia.
Toulouse's Mauvaka got the nod because of the impact he offers off the bench. Galthie has said that this squad has been selected with the final 20 minutes in mind –a weak period for Les Bleus since 2020.
“Our method has evolved regarding our team composition,” Galthie said when the squad was unveiled. “We wanted to consider how our team would perform in the last few minutes.”
France have lost six of their 18 games under Galthie. Five of those defeats came late on.
“We have to look for everything we can improve in this area. We started our team composition with our finishers, so that it is solid.”
Bougarit is too similar to firstchoice Julien Marchand and Barlot to hold the ‘finishing' hooker's role. Mauvaka offers something different, something that the France coaches believe will be decisive in the closing minutes.
Another who missed out, Louis Carbonel – starting fly-half in the first two of France's matches against Australia in July – was a victim, perhaps, of Toulon's poor start to the season. He has been replaced by the player who took his shirt for the final Test in Brisbane, Antoine Hastoy.
The question of who should start at 10 for next month's first men's Test against Argentina on November 6 has exercised minds in France since the squad was unveiled. And, it was reported this week, that France are considering moving 2019's World Breakthrough Player of the Year Romain Ntamack to 12 to accommodate long-standing rival Matthieu Jalibert at 10. Both have seven caps in the Galthie era.
Of the two options to play both, it is the one that makes most sense.
Although Jalibert has played at fullback in the Top 14, he has done so only four times in his professional career. Ntamack has played 25 times at 12, but his last inside-centre start was back in December 2020, in a Champions Cup match against Ulster.
It would be a risk, for all that Jalibert and Ntamack are supremely talented players. Ntamack once said that he considers himself an outand-out 10 when he is called to the France squad.
The favoured option would appear to be to move Gael Fickou out to 13, meaning Virimi Vakatawa would miss out altogether.
If it works in the autumn series, the word is a Jalibert-Ntamack 10-12 partnership could become a regular up to the World Cup at least. It seems Galthie and his assistants have been considering it for some time.
“Gael Fickou would move out to 13, meaning Virimi Vakatawa would miss out altogether”
Jalibert emerged unscathed from Bordeaux's bonus point-winning 39-13 shellacking of Perpignan at Stade Chaban Delmas. He was hooked, game long won, after 52 minutes, along with fellow France call-up Yoram Moefana – after which there was still plenty of time for the hosts to run in two tries.
Camille Lopez limped off the pitch with a knee injury two minutes into Clermont's 42-20 win over Pau at Stade Marcel Michelin. The visitors – with Jordan Joseph on the bench, having moved south on loan from Racing 92 on Monday – were 13-6 ahead at half-time, courtesy of a Clovis Le Bail score, but could not cope with the hosts' five-try pace and power in the second period.
Damian Penaud rounded off the scoring ten minutes from time to give the fans something to remember him by while he's on France duty.
Lyon's new star-signing Lima Sopoaga, in his second outing for the French club after his summer switch from Wasps, found out the hard way at Stade Francais that the one-minute rule for penalty kicks is strictly enforced in the Top 14.
Those lost three points just before the hour would not have been enough to win the game – the final score in Paris was 23-18 in the hosts' favour – nor were they a turning point as much as the 20-minute period at the end of the first half in which Stade scored 20 unanswered points.
After four defeats on the bounce, including two in seven days on home soil, Biarritz enjoyed a fiesta under the Basque sun, running in five tries, including two for Henry Speight, to beat Brive 37-9, as Top 14 home-win service temporarily at least resumed after last weekend's unusual five away wins statistic.
But Montpellier threw a spanner in the home-wins works, offsetting one of their two home losses this season with a deserved 21-32 victory at Racing 92, courtesy of two tries from scrum-half Cobus Reinach –cheered-on by the bulk of the Springboks November tour squad, who were in the crowd at La Defense Arena – and a perfect afternoon with the boot from fly-half Paolo Garbisi.
After last week's loss at Lyon, there was something inevitable about Toulouse's crushing 41-0 win over Castres at Ernest Wallon to reclaim their place at the top of the table, after Bordeaux had overtaken them, briefly, hours earlier. It was no surprise, either, that Romain Ntamack would issue a late reminder to the selectors of his qualities as an out-half.
Tonight, La Rochelle entertain Toulon at Stade Marcel Deflandre. Freddie Michalak is to join the under-pressure visitors in December as a consulting skills coach.
Toulon found something approaching team unity in defeat at home against Racing last week, but president Bernard Lemaitre will be watching closely to decide if he needs more urgent changes to his under-performing coaching set-up.
