Everything came together to get this Six Nations Tournament off to a good start: a great opponent, a fired-up crowd, a spirit of revenge after the World Cup, new players eager to do battle.
Everything was there, but nothing worked for this XV of France, swept away Friday evening by Ireland (17-38).
And in the locker room of the Vélodrome stadium, it was a speech full of disappointment that the new captain Grégory Alldritt delivered.
" It's very hard.
As I said in the locker room, this is not the face we wanted to show, we would have liked to offer a slightly more festive first selection to Posolo (Tuilagi) and Nolann (Le Garrec), as others were able to make a living from it in previous years.”
This French XV with 80% victories, as Fabien Galthié never fails to remind us, had in fact lost the habit of starting the Six Nations Tournament with a defeat.
And it is also very heavy and left the players stunned.
“It’s very, very hard for all the players, we’re not used to it,” continues Grégory Alldritt.
We play to win every match.
It's a headache to be honest.
But we have character.
We will try, assume responsibility, keep our heads high and do everything so that there is a revolt next week.
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“Taking 40 points at home hurts”
But in the meantime, all the Blues who spoke on Friday night in Marseille were struggling to find explanations for the rout.
“We are going to have a busy start to the week, we will have to analyze it.
Tonight it’s too hard to talk about it,” says Grégory Alldritt.
“Taking 40 points at home hurts.
We started the match badly, we were quickly put under pressure, and ran behind the score, we never managed to get back on track.
This large gap in the score made us curl up on ourselves and did not allow us to free ourselves,” third row François Cros still tries to analyze.
Read alsoFrance-Ireland (17-38): Lucu overwhelmed, Gabrillagues floats… The notes of the Blues
This XV of France particularly suffered on the touchline, in the ground game, and was uninspired in attack.
“We were unable to put our gaming system in place,” regrets François Cros.
There were also changes in the staff, with a new touchline system, modifications to the offensive system.
And being under pressure we were unable to gain confidence in this system which we had mastered well over the two weeks of preparation.
It's a failure for tonight but we will continue to work so as not to lose the confidence we had.
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The disappointment could be read on the marked face of Paul Gabrillagues, despite his good performance and his attempt for his return to blue 4 years after his last selection.
“Pff, I wanted to win… breathes the Parisian.
It's complicated to analyze, I don't know.
We have to move forward quickly.
Life, sport is like that, you have an obstacle, you fall but you have to quickly get back up.”
Especially since a difficult trip to Scotland is looming next Saturday.
“We will have to tell each other the truths”
In any case, all the Blues showed solidarity with Paul Willemse, the second row sent off after half an hour of play, leaving his teammates at 14 for the rest of the match.
“I’m thinking a lot about Paul this evening, he’s very sad.
He had a lot to give for this jersey, it was eating away at him.
We can’t blame a player who wants to give everything to this jersey,” defends Grégory Alldritt.
“We protect ourselves, we stay among ourselves, this is not the time to find those responsible,” continues the captain who foresees a complicated start to the week at Marcoussis, which the Blues will join on Saturday: “We will have to tell each other the truths.
I am convinced that we will show a different face.
We have less cards in hand but the French team will fight until the last day of this Tournament.
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