6N Round 1: France v Scotland, 7 February

First topic message reminder :

     
FRANCE v SCOTLAND
Saturday 7 February 2015
KO 17:00 (GMT)/18:00 (local)
Stade de France, Paris

Live on BBC1.

Referee: Nigel Owens (WRU)
Touch Judge 1: Glen Jackson (NZR)
Touch Judge 2: Mike Fraser (NZR)
TMO: George Ayoub (ARU)

A. Teams:

1. France

15 Scott Spedding (Bayonne)
14 Yoann Huget (Toulouse)
13 Mathieu Bastareaud (Toulon)
12 Wesley Fofana (Clermont)
11 Teddy Thomas (Racing Metro)
10 Camille Lopez (Clermont)
09 Rory Kockott (Castres)

01 Alexandre Menini (Toulon)
02 Guilhem Guirado (Toulon)
03 Rabah Slimani (Stade Francais)
04 Pascal Papé (Stade Francais)
05 Yoann Maestri (Toulouse)
06 Thierry Dusautoir (c) (Toulouse)
07 Bernard Le Roux (Racing Metro)
08 Damien Chouly (Clermont )

16 Benjamin Kayser (Clermont)
17 Uini Atonio (La Rochelle)
18 Eddy Ben Arous (Racing Metro)
19 Romain Taofifenua (Toulon)
20 Loann Goujon (La Rochelle)
21 Morgan Parra (Clermont)
22 Rémi Talès (Castres)
23 Rémi Lamerat (Castres)

2. Scotland

15 Stuart Hogg (Glasgow Warriors)
14 Tommy Seymour (Glasgow Warriors)
13 Mark Bennett (Glasgow Warriors)
12 Alex Dunbar (Glasgow Warriors)
11 Tim Visser (Edinburgh Rugby)
10 Finn Russell (Glasgow Warriors)
9 Greig Laidlaw CAPTAIN (Gloucester)

1 Alasdair Dickinson (Edinburgh Rugby)
2 Ross Ford (Edinburgh Rugby)
3 Euan Murray (Glasgow Warriors)
4 Richie Gray (Castres)
5 Jonny Gray (Glasgow Warriors)
6 Rob Harley (Glasgow Warriors)
7 Blair Cowan (London Irish)
8 Johnnie Beattie (Castres)

16 Fraser Brown (Glasgow Warriors)
17 Gordon Reid (Glasgow Warriors)
18 Geoff Cross (London Irish)
19 Jim Hamilton (Saracens)
20 Alasdair Strokosch (USA Perpignan)
21 Sam Hidalgo-Clyne (Edinburgh Rugby)
22 Peter Horne (Glasgow Warriors)
23 Dougie Fife (Edinburgh Rugby)

B. Tournament Form (last 3 games):

1. France

15/3/14 - France 20 - 22 Ireland

8/3/14 - Scotland 17 - 19 France

21/2/14 - Wales 27 - 6 France

2. Scotland

15/3/14 - Wales 51 - 3 Scotland

8/3/14 - Scotland 17 - 19 France

22/2/14 - Italy 20 - 21 Scotland

C. Head to Head:

87 Played 87
50 Wins 34
34 Losses 50
3 Draws 3
153 Tries 132
78 Conversions 70
119 Penalties 127
28 Drop Goals 15
1,228 Points 1,049

Turning out to be the match of the weekend this one. Two positive teams trying to play rugby. And that man Nigel Owens presiding again. Top stuff.

Hogg and Bennett look bloody brilliant

Our more experienced players - Laidlaw and Beattie, aren't performing well

I don't really know how to react having backs that are very dangerous, i kind of feel like they should knock it on close to the line like has happened for as long as i've watched us. Nice change though!

Both Grays amazing so far, Beattie need to take the gloves off though. Cowan looks great too.

Owens need to get a look at some of France's lineouts throw, some of them didn't even allow Scotland to contest the ball.

VinceWLB wrote:Both Grays amazing so far, Beattie need to take the gloves off though. Cowan looks great too.

Owens need to get a look at some of France's lineouts throw, some of them didn't even allow Scotland to contest the ball.

Was thinking the same thing, so many throws not even close to being straight.

Scotland are well in this and if the hold them out for the 10mins after 1/2 time, they will put massive pressure on the French.

Russell showed the difference between him and weir in that last play

Russell, Hogg, Bennett and Cowan having great games.

We need someone to really smash into the rucks as we're getting bossed at ruck time.

Russell is tackling like s demon

Here comes the mental implosion.

France don't know how to deal with the Glasgow's defense though.

Stupid from fife - why not just leave it?? That could cost us the game

fife stupid

beattie wtf are you doing hanging onto ankles in a maul? lucky not to be pinged for that one.

Is it just me or do France have ball women instead of ball boys. And they're hotties???

Soft penalty for the home team here.

It's all gone a wee bit Poopie

How can Owens and the AR not see France's crooked throws in the line outs?

Feels like the game is slipping away. The big French carriers starting to make yards.

Owens 15 Scotland 8

Owens gifting the game to France.

Sloppy sloppy half so far!

Russell is having a great great game

We've done really well in some aspects but lacking in others - not been good this half

I would bring Hamilton now to disrupt the maul

Utterly miserable game from Beattie. Denton and Ashe can't come back quick enough.

VinceWLB wrote:I would bring Hamilton now to disrupt the maul

LOL. all you do is complain about the ref pinging glasgow and scotland players infringing. then you say scotland need a specialist maul infringer on...

Horne on, i fear the worst

Horne on

quinsforever wrote:

VinceWLB wrote:I would bring Hamilton now to disrupt the maul

LOL. all you do is complain about the ref pinging glasgow and scotland players infringing. then you say scotland need a specialist maul infringer on...

pot kettle black

Before people criticise, I thought that was a fair gamble from Visser.

Holy crap that was close from visser!

funnyExiledScot wrote:Before people criticise, I thought that was a fair gamble from Visser.

One of those, if it works you're a hero, if it doesn't you're a fool moments.

I say he did the right thing.

Is there a more selfish and attention seeking scrum half than Morgan Parra??

Visser totally did the right thing.

Mon boys. We're still in this.

Nachos Jones wrote:How can Owens and the AR not see France's crooked throws in the line outs?

I've noticed crooked throws getting ignored quite a lot lately - bizarrely the only one I think that got called last night was England throwing crooked but towards the Welsh line. Mind you some of the French ones today might as well have been thrown straight to the scrum-half.

Cowan should have passed that ball ffs

That's the game. Mighty shame, felt we could have had that.

Game over.

Very frustrating, but we've had plenty chances to win this!

Good performance but we were undone by our inability at the ruck. Too many penalties coz we're not clearing out.

Hmm "plucky scots denied victory" could be any year, most games. But definite actual progress for Scotland, who will need to close one out this year to convert that.

Hard luck Scotland but massive, massive improvement. Going to France and winning is no mean feat and Scotland put France under loads of pressure. Keeping France tryless and scoring one of your own in Paris is impressive.

I think that England, Wales and Ireland will sit up and take a lot more notice of Scotland now.

Shame you lost but well done at the same time.

Some real positives and plenty to build on, but we were very much second best that half.

Positives though - when did we last go to Paris and not conceed a try??

Lacks of quality from the bench showed at the end but proud effort.

Glasgow need to get Richie Gray signed up for next season asap!

Hard luck Scotland. More exciting than the first game and Halfpenney could take a leaf from Hoggs efforts in trying to spark something from the back. France too solid if not flashy. Good heart, just missing some finishing in key moments.

TheRugbyMaster wrote:Turning out to be the match of the weekend this one. Two positive teams trying to play rugby. And that man Nigel Owens presiding again. Top stuff.

Thank you

Seriously proud of that performance, France were a step too far tonight but with more time together this team are going to move forward. Haven't been following the thread on here so not sure what others feeling has been, but I hope there hasn't been the usual 606v2 moaning about the ref, our lack of precision when it counted lost us the game, not the ref

VinceWLB wrote:Both Grays amazing so far, Beattie need to take the gloves off though. Cowan looks great too.

Owens need to get a look at some of France's lineouts throw, some of them didn't even allow Scotland to contest the ball.

Unfortunately the law is that it must be no wider than inline with the french team - and these have been spot on landing on the french guys head

VinceWLB wrote:Owens gifting the game to France.

awa' an Poopie ye big jessie

quinsforever wrote:

VinceWLB wrote:I would bring Hamilton now to disrupt the maul

LOL. all you do is complain about the ref pinging glasgow and scotland players infringing. then you say scotland need a specialist maul infringer on...

Aye - but he is our penalty magnet therefore can do no wrong. Any way he is called big Jim

Got to say, if we have similar performances like that this tournament and only beat Italy I'll be heartbroken - I really, really want us to do more!

funnyExiledScot wrote:Before people criticise, I thought that was a fair gamble from Visser.

Yup

TJ wrote:

VinceWLB wrote:Both Grays amazing so far, Beattie need to take the gloves off though. Cowan looks great too.

Owens need to get a look at some of France's lineouts throw, some of them didn't even allow Scotland to contest the ball.

Unfortunately the law is that it must be no wider than inline with the french team - and these have been spot on landing on the french guys head

The law is fine but I counted at least 3 lineouts that were well behind the French team line. They were very poorly missed.
No impact on the score but I do wish that it was policed like most other elements of the game.