Gabrielle Vernier: 'We're not far off an achievement' against England
The centre of the French women’s team is taking a clear-headed approach to the final crunch match of the 2024 Guinness Women’s Six Nations.
Gabrielle Vernier (26, 44 caps) has faced England nine times in her career. And never, never has the French women’s centre beaten the Red Roses. Twice the margin has been just two points: 17-15 at Exeter on 16 November 2019 and by the exact same score at Villeneuve-d’Ascq on 30 April 2021.
As she prepares to take on England in the final match of the 2024 Guinness Women’s Six Nations in Bordeaux, the Blagnac player is under no illusions. “England will be favourites and we’ll be looking for a feat,” she told L’Equipe’s aptly-named Crunch podcast.
“It’s a feat we have to achieve. We know England are on a great run in the Six Nations. We have the weapons to try and compete with them and we can’t wait to show what we can do and seize the opportunity to complete a Grand Slam.”
The player who is one of the leaders of this year’s squad was reluctant to talk about the clash with England at the start of the tournament. Experience, no doubt. Wisdom. “We know we’re capable of making mistakes, of having bad games. It wouldn’t have helped us to think about England at the start of the tournament,” she says.
“We’ve learnt to take it one game at a time, put in good performances to grow throughout this Six Nations and I think we’ve done that. We’ve built ourselves up, we’ve played games with varying degrees of success. But it’s all about learning and we’ve improved in terms of level and skill, so we’ve got all the ingredients this weekend.”
The ingredients needed
The ingredients include a free-flowing game that is as pleasing to play as it is to watch, instilled by the coaching duo of Gaëlle Mignot and David Ortiz. It was also the scrum that saved France against Wales, when the lineouts were in a sorry state with six loose balls.
“It’s really important to get a clean sheet in the big games. Wales read us really well and counter-attacked really well in this game. It’s up to us to work hard to come up with something different against England. Luckily, we have a very solid scrum,” the engineer smiled.
The other ingredient is discipline, which has not been lacking so far: 33 penalties whistled in four games, the second most disciplined team in the tournament behind Ireland with 32. Everything was fine until three cards against Wales on matchday four.
“It’s a bit of a lack of control on our part. It happens. It’s true that three cards in the course of a game is a bit much,” she said, trying to put things into perspective.
If Les Bleues have such a good record, it’s undoubtedly thanks to the recurring presence of Aurélie Groizeleau, the international referee who comes to Marcoussis from time to time to oversee training sessions.
“She gives us feedback on the games we play and explains the mistakes we make. She takes part in our matches and gives us live feedback on the mistakes we might be making. It pays off,” says Vernier.
So close
Like the coaches, the centre believes the team is ready to “cause an upset” against John Mitchell’s team, especially as the win will come with a first Grand Slam since 2018. It was her first, her only to date. And nothing since.
“We’re a generation that’s worked for years and years and haven’t had a title to show for it. It’s frustrating for all the hard work we put in every day to win titles. But we don’t come here thinking we’re not going to win anything. On the contrary, we tell ourselves that we’re not the favourites, but we also know that we’re not far away from doing something. It would be the best reward for all the hard work we’ve put in over the years,” she says.
If the French are aware that they’re “not far from an achievement”, it’s because they’re still thinking about the last time these two teams met, in front of 58,498 at Twickenham in 2023. England won the Grand Slam 38-33 in a match marked by two very different halves.
“We had a total blank for 20-25 minutes where we scored 30 points in 20 minutes,” recalls the 2023 Player of the Tournament. “We were in their half for the first 20 minutes, and we didn’t score. That’s what put us in this situation. If we’d scored in the opening minutes of last year’s game, I think it would have been a different story.”
Trailing 33-0 at the break and in trouble after two yellow cards (Jessy Trémoulière and Rose Bernadou), Les Bleues fought back in the second half with a first try from Emilie Boulard (48th), a second from Gabrielle Vernier (55th), a third from Charlotte Escudero (65th), a fourth from Emeline Gros (76th) and a last one from Cyrielle Banet (79th).
Meanwhile, the Red Roses could only manage one try. But the damage had already been done.
“In previous meetings, we have missed the first half,” admits Gaby. “It’s a fresh memory. We talk about it amongst ourselves. This second half shows that we’re capable of anything if we play with freedom, if we play good rugby and have fun.
“We managed to take them completely off their game in the second half. Last year’s game showed us what we’re capable of when all the ingredients come together. It gives us even more motivation for this year because we know we’re capable of doing great things against them.”
The French know what it takes to succeed and have been working towards that goal all week. A record crowd at the Stade Chaban-Delmas in Bordeaux – “I’m hoping for 30,000!” – could be the extra edge France need for victory.
Comments on RugbyPass
Amazing. The losing team’s ratings are higher than the winning team’s. Mallia definitely didn’t deserve a y. What game were you watching? Should have got a w or an x. ADP hardly featured in that second half. At one point I wondered when he’d been subbed. Seems to me as if he gets an automatic 9 just for getting onto the team sheet.
1 Go to commentsI’m sorry. That second half was far from enthralling. It was painful to watch.
1 Go to commentsVery generous! If you’d missed the game, reading this you’d conclude that it was the Quins front row that cost them the game. Marler getting a blanket 6 for his demented contribution to the game. Puzzling.
1 Go to commentsCan’t see Toulouse beating Leinster at this rate.
7 Go to commentsADP was having a very average game until winning that penalty for Toulouse, sticking his big head in the way. “The head of God”?
7 Go to commentsHarlequins doing their best to do as little damage as possible with all the possession. Looks like they skipped catch and pass drills this week.
7 Go to commentsSeeing pictures of Jacques high-fiving it with Irish players breaks my heart. Too soon. I need more time.
1 Go to commentsquins is all over the place. The minute they get the ball they panic. Quins can still win tho just need to win all rucks otherwise just don't bother.
7 Go to commentsGreat wins for the male & female kiwi sides. Ireland not far away..
1 Go to commentsWhy is this dude getting so much coverage? Usually knobs like this get cancelled.
2 Go to commentsWow. What was that? A 3 million word meandering article about what exactly?
2 Go to commentsNice piece of writing. And yes the Sharks pulled a rabbit from the hat and were a little lucky with that penalty try that wasn’t given… however the Sharks (with their resources) should be way more consistent and should be putting teams like Claremont away for breakfast. I expect more from them and hope they kick on now.
8 Go to commentsJust what the Sharks needed to get things going in the right direction Defence on the outside really creates havoc for the whole team and needs to be addressed.
8 Go to commentsWell done guys both teams will be ready to play knockout rugby.
1 Go to commentsSurprised that Ramos isn't starting at 15. But what a squad of galacticos!
2 Go to commentsWhy is it a snub? What journalistic garbage is that? Sure the guy is a great player, but there are plenty of loose forwards and not all of them can be Springboks. Also, I know of no-one who doubts Rassie’s judgment. South Africa has a conveyor belt of loose forwards that just keeps producing, so the competition is intense. I certainly wish him well, but there is no entitlement and there is no snub.
17 Go to commentsSkelton may be brought back for the Wallabies so that would be the only reason that may hinder Wilson. Easily the form, most skilful and game IQ of any Oz 8. Valentini’s best and favourite position is 6, but lineouts may be an issue with Skelton, Valentini and Wilson. Will be interesting what Schmidt goes for but for me Wilson should be picked on form. Schmidt rewards work rate, skill and consistency. All that glitters every so often won’t be in contention. Greely is one of those players that has a knack of making the right decision. A coach is going to love him because he knows week in week out he’s going to get the job done. The second try Greely wasn’t the guy who made the initial break it was Flook, Greely was at the bottom of the ruck when Flook was off along the sideline. Greely got up and made the effort to catch up with play but also read the play nicely and hit the pass from Campbell at pace and then held the pass beautifully to Ryan.
6 Go to commentsSpot on Ben. Dead right. Havili looked great at 10. Easily the highest rugby IQ of any NZ player these days. Getting a kick charged down is a result of getting used to adjusting your depth to the line at 10, which he will sort out with time. But other than that it was an outstanding first effort in that position this year. I think the NZ media has misunderstood this directive from Razor. Havili might rank behind B Barrett this year, but Beuden is 33 this month and won't last much longer. DMaC is great but flaky and not really a test match animal (his efforts in Dunedin versus Aus last year for example). If Razor can't have Mounga, DMaC is too unstructured for Razor (and is just too small for test rugby). Havili will end up our first choice first five, and in partnership with Jodie will be excellent. Two triple threat operators in tandem, and big bodies and tough tacklers to boot. Jordoe will be the ABs goal kicker. I am an Aucklander and Blues (and Warriors) fan, but Havili at 10 is going to be sensational in time… he can be the best first five in the world by the end of this year. No question.
6 Go to commentsSharks deserved to be far further back by the last quarter. Their tackling was awful, their set pieces were disappointing, their defensive organization was poor (especially on the Kok side of the D line), they kept making unnecessary errors, and they never looked like cracking the Clermont defense during those first 60m. Masuku kept them in touch, with some help from the Clermont generosity on penalty opportunities. Agree with the writer of this article. It was belligerence, and ability to raise their pressure game just enough, that turned the last quarter into a Bok-style shutout. Clermont have a reputation of not playing the full 80m, and there was a bit of that for sure. But, quite often when the intensity of a team drops off in the last quarter credit is due to the opponent for tiring them out. At 60m, with the Kok try, you thought that just maybe the game was on. At 70m, with the Mapimpi contribution, one felt that Clermont were fading, while facing a team that would maintain the pressure game through the final whistle. Good win in the end, but the Sharks are still playing way below their potential. And with their resources, and a coach that has had enough time to figure things out, they are running out of excuses.
8 Go to commentsGood riddance
1 Go to comments