France 14-19 Tonga
Matthew Rye
Deputy Sports Editor
After a week of criticism and accusations of game-throwing, infighting and bad player-coach relations, you’d have expected the French team to come back strongly, silence their critics and prove to everybody at the World Cup that they were capable of winning.
Instead, they performed even worse than in their apparently thrown game against the All-Blacks, as they looked thoroughly muted, uninspired and lustreless.
The Tongans on the other hand were their polar opposite; they were fiery and immovable in defence, enterprising and fearless in attack, and they had too much explosiveness for a French team that was still lacking in both direction and leadership.
Even a late Vincent Clerc try wasn’t enough to save a poor Marc Lievremont side. Clerc’s try, which came on the final whistle, only did enough to secureFrancea losing bonus point.
Francecouldn’t take advantage ofTongawhen they were down to 14 men after Tongan try scorer, Sukanaivalu Hufanga, was sin-binned for a high tackle on enigmatic French winger Vincent Clerc.
Hufanga’s try forTongacame on the half-hour mark after out-half Kurt Morath’s cross-field kick was met by the Tongan winger, following a line-break by scrum-half Taniela Moa. Hufanga managed to beat French forward Julien Bonnaire to touch down in the corner.
Two penalties from Dimitri Yachvili before the end of the break keptFrancewithin touch, but for the most part, they had been architects of their own destruction. They had no creative edge, no spark.Tongacompeted valiantly at the breakdown and slowed the ball down consistently, denying the French the quick ruck ball, which they can be so devastating with. They also missed an opportunity to score in the first half, after returning hooker Nicolas Servat was penalised for a questionable double movement on the Tongan line.
This is by a significant margin, the biggest upset victory by a Tongan side since they beatAustraliain the 1970’s. Even though the Tongans will exit the tournament at this stage, they seemed delighted with the victory, as they should be.
Strangely enough,Francewill progress to the next round of the tournament, and in truth were lucky to do so.Tongafailed to capitalize on some opportunities, and even threw away several overlaps during the final stages of the match, as their superior fitness proved to be a telling factor.
Francewere unable to play expansive rugby at any point in the game, due to the nature of defence from the Tongan team.Tongadefended resolutely, and the sheer ferocity of the tackles from the South Sea Islanders was enough to discourage the French from attacking consistently.
Parra didn’t have the exact skill-set to attack vehemently against this Tongan team, as he predominantly plays for position, which didn’t work well today.
One ofFrance’s biggest pitfalls was their inability to do the simple things well. They didn’t pass accurately, didn’t ruck efficiently, and they adapt their game plan to take advantage of their opponents.
France will struggle in the latter stages of this tournament if they continue to reach such new lows. However, in a typically French manner, they could come back from this to storm the competition and cause a World Cup upset. With Lievremont at the helm, there will never be such a thing as French reliability.
