Eventually this affected the national team. I know of world-class players who, if they had picked up a man of the match award on the Saturday, wouldn’t rock up until midweek at the club and no one seemed to care.
Some overseas players such as Jonny Wilkinson added immense value some of the others appeared to do just enough to get their retirement plans in order. Toulon were spending millions on players but their coaches were hatching plans in temporary buildings. The structures being built in England around strength and conditioning, sports science and academies were not being replicated in France. If anything else is needed to fire up France, the vocal criticism of the team by the French media this week will have done thatĪt one point every Top 14 team were running their own version of fantasy football and talent ID was done with a chequebook. The consequence has been national teams with a lack of experience, skill sets and trusted combinations as well as reduced levels of conditioning. The best of the French have found it hard to break into those positions and the younger players have rarely made the matchday squads.Īt first the influx of overseas players had no impact on Les Bleus but this could not last. It is not just that more than 40% of the Top 14 have been overseas players but that the key positions such as eight, nine, 10 and 12 have been stacked full of highly paid overseas talent. Now, this may sound disingenuous but take away the Irish central contract system and the English elite player squad agreement and you may begin to show some sympathy to the current crop of players and coaches playing for France where the clubs have held sway. The success of the French age group sides has shown that when the FFR has a good level of control over its players they compete with the best consistently. It started to happen in 2004 after the Kolpak ruling that French clubs pounced on and the erosion has been left unattended until recently.
So where can we find the reasons behind what happened in Paris? Before jumping straight to other over-simplified answers such as a lack of concentration or confidence, it is important to unpick this properly.Ī lack of control, which became apparent during the second half, was rooted in a lack of consistency in their preparation.