‘You reap what you sow’: Justin Marshall fires fresh shot at France

I should be a fan of Marshall as a commentator, given he is a Crusaders great and a world class All Black, but he can be astoundingly ignorant, as his initial comment reveals. As others have described, France is in the top six atm, will remain in the top six until the RWC draw, so there is no possibility of them drawing the Springboks or the All Blacks etc. The particular danger is that they will draw Australia, whose wildly inconsistent performances have put them in the 2nd band, or Scotland, but those are dangers all first band teams face.

Marshall is also wrong about France in test rugby, particularly in world cups. They can’t reap what they sow because they have no idea what they are sowing. France struggle or lose at world cups, stagger into the quarters, often get a really lucky draw, struggle against lesser teams in a knockout game, or go full shapeshifter and beat a better team. Frequently the All Blacks. Then fail in their next game, which is often the final. France often lose when they are well prepared, 2023, and often win when they are in chaos, 2011. The normal rules of sporting physics do not apply to France at test level. Though, thankfully, they always lose in the end.

The one thing that Marshall is right about is French rugby as a whole treating test rugby with contempt. Victory for France in RWC 2027 will be treated as a justification of every abuse the Top 14 has inflicted on rugby as a whole and test rugby in particular. Given the choice between a Springbok threepeat or a French win, I choose the Boks. Though hopefully It will never come to that. I mean, imagine supporting the Boks against France in the RWC final...

I think a big issue with the French is how the clubs have gone back to signing non-French players again. Heading towards the last world cup there seemed to be a big focus on home-grown, but since then, its back to buying up talent from abroad.

The best player in the league is not French. His brother has just been another big signing on what must be a load of money to walk away from his Saracens contract and the England contract.

On Saturday I looked at the score board at around 60 mins and was surprised France were only ahead by a point. They then looked very unfit and their backs blunt. Considering the amount of stoppages' - no rugby match should take 2 hours from start to finish - the energy was way down from France.

It will be interesting to see how they play against Fiji at the weekend. Fortunately for them they are playing Australia last who will probably punch themselves out against Ireland this week (and still lose) and have nothing left.

Justin goes hard!

Actually england sent a ‘B’ team to Argentina and won 2-0. With the B&I Lions on tour, most of the 6Nations had depleted teams on tour. Will Marshy say anything when New Zealand put out a ‘B’ team against Wales? No, he’ll claim it’s player development.

I don't get it. England tour Argentina quite frequently and use it as a chance to blood new players and Argentina never claim disrespect. NZ are quite fond of this “disrespecting us” shtick from smiling sardonically at the haka to refusing to show fear while some Maori fella threatens to slit your throat. While we're on the subject talk to a New Zealander about the respect they have for non rugby playing Maoris and you'll be surprised…or maybe not. Give it a rest, Justin.

The reasons related to the B-team fiasco have been ventilated enough. Unless we start drawing pictures for people to follow - saying “I told you so” is pointless.

For context: the French went toe-to-toe with the Boks for 60 mins. And for those 60 mins looked better than most other teams out there.

Admittedly, they looked like a team that hadn't trained enough. Their fitness let them down as far as I am concerned.

They were missing a few key players (everyone does from time to time) and a few areas of their game lacked bite.

1. Ntamack was anonymous. He fielded a kick in the final 20 minutes of the game and I genuinely forgot he was still playing in this game. What is his role if Ramos is running the show?

2. The French midfield was anonymous. Ramos seemed to be the only spark in their attack. And of course their wingers looked exceptional when they got the ball. Danger signs for everyone.

Handling errors really let them down - a sure sign of rust.

3. The French put out a really inexperienced front row agains the Boks. What else was going to happen come scrum time?

All of the above considered - the outcome seems inevitable, but also a valuable learning curve for Galthie and the team. Losing this test was not the end of the world.

The French have paid the price for development of the team. And will peak at the appropriate time.

Just to correct a couple of pieces of bollocks…

A) That B-team came within a score of beating the ABs in the first test, which is a bit embarrassing no?

B) It doesn't matter if you're ranked first or sixth; you're in band one either way and there's no impact on the draw.

France went to Nz and gave a few players a go. Yes they lost but they also answered a few questions about France and asked a few questions about Nz. They lost against the Springboks with all the advantage they could get while not playing too badly in doing so. Imho hyping of France and Ireland should stop. Results are all that matter and they are not comming atm. Nz are still a top 2 side way ahead of the rest below them. Are French players better than Nz players? What does the results say. Shout out to the Six nations tourney. Never invite the Sprinboks to join! Unless you really want all the silverware to stay in the Sh.