6N 2017: France v Scotland, 12 February

First topic message reminder :

      
FRANCE v SCOTLAND
12 February 2017
16:00 CET (UTC+1)
Stade de France, Paris

Referee: Jaco Peyper (RSA)
Touch judges: John Lacey (IRE) & Luke Pearce (ENG)
TMO: Peter Fitzgibbon (IRE)

Live on [BBC, RTE, DMAX, FR2, ITV (H)]

A. Head to Head

90 Played 90
52 Won 35
3 Drawn 3
35 Lost 52
1,280 Points 1,102

B. Recent Form

13 March 2016
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
29 – 18 to Scotland

5 September 2015
Stade de France, Saint-Denis
19 – 16 to France

7 February 2015
Stade de France, Saint-Denis
15 – 8 to France

8 March 2014
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
17 – 19 to France

16 March 2013
Stade de France, Saint-Denis
23 – 16 to France

26 February 2012
Murrayfield, Edinburgh
17 – 23 to France

C. Teams

FRANCE 

15-Scott Spedding; 14-Noa Nakaitaci, 13-Remi Lamerat, 12-Gael Fickou, 11-Virimi Vakatawa; 10-Camille Lopez, 9-Baptiste Serin; 1-Cyril Baille, 2-Guilhem Guirado, 3-Uini Atonio, (captain), 4-Sebastien Vahaamahina, 5-Yoann Maestri, 6-Loann Goujon, 7-Kevin Gourdon, 8-Louis Picamoles,

Replacements: 16-Christopher Tolofua, 17-Rabah Slimani, 18-Xavier Chiocci, 19-Julian Le Devedec, 20-Damien Chouly, 21-Maxime Machenaud, 22-Jean-Marc Doussain, 23-Yoann Huget

SCOTLAND

15-Stuart Hogg, 14-Sean Maitland, 13-Tommy Seymour, 12-Huw Jones, 11-Alex Dunbar, 10-Finn Russell, 9-Greig Laidlaw; 1-Allan Dell, 2-Fraser Brown, 3-Zander Fagerson, 4-Richie Gray, 5-Jonny Gray, 6-John Barclay, 7-Josh Strauss, 8- Hamish Watson.

Replacements: 16-Ross Ford, 17-Gordon Reid, 18-Simon Berghan, 19-Tim Swinson, 20-John Hardie, 21-Alistair Price, 22-Duncan Weir, 23-Mark Bennett.

If Scotland win tomorrow, if, then it could come down to England v Scotland for the Grand Slam.

France actually did really well in England.
I'd not underestimate them.  Though I'm hoping it's not another year when Scotland show a bit of promise then fall flat on their faces.  As that has basically been happening for the last decade.

Every year we seem to swing in roundabouts, Scotland lose but score loads of points, but concede even more.  Or Scotland lose but concede few points, and but score even fewer.  

So Scotland tighten up their game, but can't score tries, or open up but start to concede tries.  Basically the coach can say were making "progress" in attack, or were making "progress" in defense.

I said on another thread I think the Wales game is Scotland's "big" one this year.

Wales have won 13 of the last 14, and Scotland haven't beaten Wales since Gareth Jenkins was Wales coach!

Yes it's true 10th of Feb 2007, was the last Welsh loss to Scotland.  Or put it another way only Ross ford in that entire Scottish squad has ever won a game against Wales! While only Alun Wyn-Jones has lost to Scotland.

While very few of those games have been close in any sense of the word.
So looking at it over the recent years, basically Scotland finish last or 5th depending on the Italy result. Last year in 2016, they did actually smash France, and Italy, and lost narrowly to Wales.

So in 2017 they beat Ireland so far, though to be fair Ireland with Johnny Sexton are a much better team. If they can take out Wales then maybe, just maybe were back to the good old days of a strong Scotland, after MANY years of false dawns and disappointments.  Now were lost it wouldn;t be the end of the world if we did lose, as having this kind of run over an opponent who is supposed to be a 50/50 game is plain crazy.

Shifty, some good points raised.
But a little skewed from you to say the last 10 years were not close. 3 years ago Wales triumphed against 14 players. I was there, and the match was killed by a weak ref being swayed by the Cardiff faithful. The honest Welsh fans around me agreed it should have been a yellow and not a red. But game and spectacle were over too early.
The last two years have had little in them. And as I recall, the refereeing reluctance to award yellow cards towards the end of one game for persistant Welsh infringements robbed us of scoring at the end, and in the last game, blindness to forward passes robbed us again.
Wales have been very fortunate the last two years to come away with victories, and if you were to be realistic, you would admit this.
But we don't play you for 2 weeks yet, and it's premature to talk of the game prior to our encounter with France. Our world revolves around our immediate fixtures.
Wait your turn, and allow us to have our battle with les bleus first, then we'll see where we both lie.
I'd love to pick up tickets for 25 Feb if I can, as I feel recent history will be overturned. But, first things first. We have an away game to deal with.....

Nerves are starting to kick in! I hope Picamoles spends a very long day smothered in a big Gray blanket, because he's in serious form at the moment and is a massive danger.

GLove39 wrote:

jimbopip wrote:Glove, I'm a huge admirer of your work . However, I can't help but feel that if the dominoes were book ended by the Eiffel Tower and a small Subbuteo type Scotland figurine and the aforementioned teeny plastic player, or the real Frodo, knocks over the first domino then it has much greater dramatic power.

Just saying mind.

Might have to hire you as a writer!

I don't come cheap; I charge my weight in Tunnocks Tea Cakes as a daily rate. Which can be expansive...and expensive. My material is new or funny. If it's funny it's not new and if it's New it's rarely funny.

Very excited for this game this afternoon. Hoping it will be full of fireworks

pre game nerves kicking in!

NERVOUS

Aye - Poopie it here an aw!

edit : That doesn't come out right at all

Anglobraveheart wrote:Shifty, some good points raised.
But a little skewed from you to say the last 10 years were not close. 3 years ago Wales triumphed against 14 players. I was there, and the match was killed by a weak ref being swayed by the Cardiff faithful. The honest Welsh fans around me agreed it should have been a yellow and not a red. But game and spectacle were over too early.
The last two years have had little in them. And as I recall, the refereeing reluctance to award yellow cards towards the end of one game for persistant Welsh infringements robbed us of scoring at the end, and in the last game, blindness to forward passes robbed us again.
Wales have been very fortunate the last two years to come away with victories, and if you were to be realistic, you would admit this.
But we don't play you for 2 weeks yet, and it's premature to talk of the game prior to our encounter with France. Our world revolves around our immediate fixtures.
Wait your turn, and allow us to have our battle with les bleus first, then we'll see where we both lie.
I'd love to pick up tickets for 25 Feb if I can, as I feel recent history will be overturned. But, first things first. We have an away game to deal with.....

Are you referring to the Stuart Hogg sending off?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mQfun_HMLs

If that's not a red card I don't know what is, and to be fair he was lucky to escape a knee into the ribs of Liam Williams a minute or so earlier, when Liam scored a try. If Liam had been unsporting and rolled around injured then Hogg might of been off there and then.

I think Scotland played well last year, but lets not forget Taylor's try at the end of the game giving a final score of 27-23, if not for the try at the end it would of been 27-16.

Even going back to 2015, the same thing happened, the final score was 26-23, and Jon Welsh scored a last minute try which Finn Russell converted, so it could easily of been 26-16.

For me scoring a last minute try to make the scoreline look better than it really is, doesn't mean that Wales were not the better team in the game.

This game is one that I have been looking forward to for a the last week after Scotland beat Ireland. This will be a true test as to where they are. Away in France with them using the battering rams will test Scotland greatly, think Scotland may win this. G'luk lads

No time now for theorizing or pontificating.

Mon Scotland

Just put money on Hogg to score a try, so I'd imagine it'll be Seymour who picks up any Scottish tries today!

I'm knackered already

Fantastic start Hon Scotland.

Exciting start. I'd have blown a gasket by now and it's only 8 mins in.

France have been off side almost every play

France playing a bit like headless chicken - hopefully they'll tire themselves out

TheMildlyFranticLlama wrote:Just put money on Hogg to score a try, so I'd imagine it'll be Seymour who picks up any Scottish tries today!

Woohoo!!

Hogg is simply brilliant on his feet.

Re-starts, the bain of Scottish rugby.

Scotland's defence not nearly as strong this week - does that show that France are much more dangerous with ball in hand than Ireland, or that the Scots are just not clicking today?

Rory_Gallagher wrote:Scotland's defence not nearly as strong this week - does that show that France are much more dangerous with ball in hand than Ireland, or that the Scots are just not clicking today?

I think it is because France have lots of big strong runners!

What happened to laidlaw?

Looks like we're going to find out how we get on without Laidlaw!

FFS Price!

tigertattie wrote:What happened to laidlaw?

Looked like he got tangled up with another player's legs ...

That's a dreadful decision - pathetic

So stupid.

So only France are allowed to shove players?

That offload from Picamole was lovely.

RDW_Scotland wrote:That's a dreadful decision - pathetic

I think that was fair. Quite the shove for something rather innocuous.

stupid play there

Jeez why does an excellent player like Hogg have to behave like a total pr1ck, lucky not to get a card

Call me all the names under the sun but Russell's kicking is awful. Do we need to roll out meatball ?

French throwing it around well.

P.s. Hogg didn't stop that try. Weak defence, drop him.

brennomac wrote:Jeez why does an excellent  player like Hogg have to behave like a total pr1ck, lucky not to get a card

High spirits. Snappy players, ... snappy attitudes.

Both teams score when keeping the ball in hand and not kicking the ball. Coincidence?

Poor defence from Hogg for that try - he had to hit him

awful attempted tackle by Hogg there. I can see a Scottish player in the bin soon

All about the quick ball from the ruck

tigertattie wrote:Call me all the names under the sun but Russell's kicking is awful. Do we need to roll out meatball ?

No

I am not one to have a go at ref's but France are certainly getting the rub of the green with the decisions...

Big decision gatland has to make.  Does Hoggs attacking brilliance outweigh his defensive frailties? That was a shocking attempt on fickou, savea would have a field day

wire, but Scotland are giving away stupid penalties

Do players not know that when you're so close to the try line, long flat passes can be easily picked off?

eirebilly wrote:I am not one to have a go at ref's but France are certainly getting the rub of the green with the decisions...

Well that's three points the other way. Russell lucky IMO, never looked like getting the ball.

What's under Russell's head bandage? Is it a gps tracker or something?!

tigertattie wrote:Do players not know that when you're so close to the try line, long flat passes can be easily picked off?

You would think so - nearly cost England yesterday too ...

I'll definitely take that halftime score!