At the Stade de France
Are you a coach happy with the performance of your team?
Fabien Galthié:
Indeed, we are very satisfied with this team, from the staff to the players.
I hope that we brought a little happiness, a little smile to these millions of supporters who cannot play rugby, cannot come to the stadium and must stay at home in a complicated context.
One of our goals this evening was to give a little pleasure to all the people who were in front of their television sets.
The idea was to produce a lot of play to exhaust the Welsh?
The idea was to win the game.
By respecting the framework in which we find a lot of elements, with but also without the ball, to properly control our energy.
The most interesting reaction is compared to what we had experienced in Scotland (
defeat in early March, Editor's note
): not to panic, to think that we will find the solutions ourselves or by putting pressure on the opponent, he would give them to us.
In the end, it's a bit of both.
We ended up strong… And a little frustrated.
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Why are you frustrated?
We think we still have some leeway.
16 penalties to 4, it's frustrating.
It is keeping the opponent in the game, returning possession and going back 40 yards.
Afterwards, we must work to reverse the course of the game. Frustrated too because our coaching was not rewarded.
We ended up with an ultra-dominant front 5 and we couldn't exploit everything there was to exploit.
Finally frustrated because we had a few game options that we did not take out.
But so much the better.
We will release them later ...
"It must be a record in the annals to score so many points by conceding so many penalties"
Your team has conceded 16 penalties. That's a lot…
We had a hard time adapting to refereeing (
from the Englishman Mr. Dickinson
).
16 penalties to 4, it's an incredible imbalance at this level.
It must be a record in the annals to score so many points while conceding so many penalties.
It shows us what we need to improve at the international level.
A word about Antoine Dupont, who broke the screen.
He lived up to the team.
He was able to make the most of our strengths, to be very good.
In a context different from the Top 14, he was able to adapt quickly enough to the offensive and defensive activity of the Welsh.
When we have players of this quality in the middle of the field - I associate Romain Ntamack with them because it is the hinge that has been good - it carries the team.
I also want to point out the very good comeback of Baptiste Serin who animated the game very well.
We feel you are measured despite this convincing success.
We are very satisfied, but we are only starting an international period (six tests).
After winning the first leg in Cardiff in February, the return had to be won.
It happened.
But this match helps us prepare Ireland.
Next Saturday presents itself the essential objective, the possibility of winning our first competition.
Knowing that the English will be in Italy ...
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XV of France: a nice corner of blue sky before the "final" against Ireland